SINGAPORE, working with major cancer centres in the region, has come up with a molecular map of stomach cancer, in what is called a vital starting point towards finding better treatments for the dreaded disease common among Asians.

Researchers at the National Cancer Centre (NCC) here led the international team from the University of Hong Kong, the University of Tokyo and Australia's Peter MacCullum Cancer Centre.

Looking at more than 300 tissue samples from cancerous tumours, and analysing over 20 million interactions among different genes, the team has made some significant discoveries.

The researchers have, for example, uncovered key molecular changes which cause the cells to divide uncontrollably and change into intestinal tissue - often a precursor to cancer.

Also, the team has been able to learn more about why certain patients survive longer because of a particular form of gene activity - all important pieces in the complex puzzle.

The work was helmed by Dr Patrick Tan, principal investigator at the NCC and group leader of the Genome Institute of Singapore.

'We get insight into not individual genes but their networks as a whole system; the switches which are turned on irrevocably, leading to the cancer,' he explained.

'One of the critical challenges in the treatment of stomach cancer has been that we were unable to assemble a molecular road map of the disease, the various pathways and aberrant proteins in the cancer cells which give rise to the problem.'

The work was included recently in the leading journal Cancer Research published by the American Association for Cancer Research.

Professor Soo Khee Chee, director of the centre here, said the work could give doctors the means to fight the cancer more effectively.

'International collaboration on this scale is crucial if we want to go beyond limited observations on stomach cancers at different centres,' he said.

'Such cutting-edge global research has pushed the boundaries of medical knowledge on the specific behaviour of stomach cancer.'

Stomach cancer is prevalent in Asia but little studied in countries such as the United States. Singapore researchers have been making new discoveries in the field.

A recent study by the National University Hospital and National University of Singapore, for example, was among the first in the world to detect a new protein in the gastric juices of stomach cancer sufferers.

The protein telomerase was detected in 96 per cent of stomach cancer patients studied by the group, with eight in 10 showing the protein not only in their cancer tissues but also in their stomach juices.

Telomerase has also been found to cause uncontrolled growth of cells, a major characteristic of cancer.

Dr Jimmy So, a consultant at the hospital's department of surgery, was a key researcher in the effort. He said the local work was one of the few studies to detect the presence of the enzyme outside the affected tissue. That could make cancer detection easier.

'The next step is to be able to pick it up in the stool or blood sample, rather than waiting for the patient to go for an endoscopy using a tube to look into the stomach.

'This will make for an easier diagnosis.'