In vitro: Performing studies with microorganisms, cells or biological molecules outside their regular biological context, usually in test-tubes, petri dishes or microtiter plates.
In vivo: Performing studies where various biological entities are tested on whole, living organisms or cells, including plants, humans or other animals.
Immunotherapy: A treatment of diseases that uses the body’s own immune system. Designed to elicit or amplify an immune response (activation immunotherapies) or to reduce or suppress an immune response (suppression immunotherapies).
Stem Cells: Biological cells that can differentiate into other types of cell and subsequently divide and multiply to produce more of the same type of cell.
Metastasis: A pathogenic agent’s spread from an initial or primary site to a different or secondary site within the host’s body.
Cancer: A group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to spread to other parts of the body.
Early Stage ProCa: Referring to prostate cancer that has not yet developed outside of the prostate gland.
Locally-advanced ProCa: Referring to prostate cancer that has just begun to spread beyond the prostate but only to areas that are just outside the prostate.
Multi-focal ProCa: Referring to prostate cancer that has a primary site but with scattered satellites of cancer in other tissues or locations in the body.
Advanced ProCa: Referring to prostate cancer that has spread to other areas of the body making treatment much more complicated.
Pre-clinical: In drug development, the stage of research that begins before clinical trials (testing in humans), and during which important feasibility, iterative testing and drug safety data are collected.
Translational Research: is the attempt to build on basic scientific research to create new therapies, procedures or diagnostics. In effect, taking laboratory studies and ‘translating’ them into potential treatments for diseases.
Peer Review: the evaluation of scientific, academic, or professional work by others working in the same field.
Clinical Trials: These are experiments or observations involving human participants and are designed to answer specific questions relating to new treatments or known interventions that warrant further study and comparison. Clinical trials generate data on safety and efficacy and can only be conducted after a approval from the relevant health authority.
Overdiagnosis: the diagnosis of “disease” that will never cause symptoms or death during a patient’s ordinarily expected lifetime. Overdiagnosis is a side effect of screening for early forms of disease and is the result of detecting a very slowly developing cancer. Overdiagnosis can only be named as such when the patient eventually dies from unrelated causes.
False Positive: a test result which wrongly indicates that a particular condition or attribute is present.
GMP (Good Manufacturing Process): the practices required to conform to the guidelines recommended by agencies that control the authorization and licensing of the manufacture and sale of consumables, medical products and cosmetics. The main purpose of GMP is to prevent harm from occurring to the end user by ensuring a minimum level of quality and consistency in production. Additional tenets include ensuring the end product is free from contamination, that its manufacture has been well documented, that personnel are well trained, and the product has been checked for quality throughout the manufacturing process.
Research KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)/Metrics: data points that provide insight into operational performance. The use of metrics is two-fold: improving processes internally and ensuring that these processes are transparent to sponsors and other interested parties.