Professor Carl Borrebaeck and Dr Ulrika Axelsson are Director and Deputy Director, respectively, of the CREATE Health Translational Cancer Centre, Lund University, Sweden; a venue with an outstanding record of world-class cancer research. They are leading research into the fascinating topic of whether cancer patients’ psychological resilience after their cancer diagnosis may be linked to biomolecular processes, suggesting a mind-body link between the ability to cope psychologically and its impact on cancer prognosis.

‘Our audacious idea is to cure cancer.’ Dr Kenneth Pienta at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, USA, speaks with genuine passion about his ground-breaking research. With his team, he has recently discovered that in every type of cancer, a special type of rare cancer cell – a polyaneuploid cancer cell (PACC) – exists and hides within the greater cancer cell population. The team hypothesises that ‘PACCs are a master mediator of therapy tolerance’ and thus, the critical treatment target. Now, in a call to arms, Dr Pienta is asking researchers and scientists across diverse disciplines to unite in developing a cure for cancer.