Dr Kevin Fenix, a Cure Cancer-funded emerging researcher, has reached the milestone he set out to achieve two years ago: a fully funded clinical trial for people living with metastatic bowel cancer.
By The Cure Cancer Team
In 2024, when Cure Cancer donors first backed Dr Kevin Fenix's bowel cancer research, he set out an ambitious goal. His project, he said, would “provide the necessary framework for the approval of an Australia-first clinical trial for metastatic bowel cancer patients in Adelaide within three years.”
That goal has now been met. Dr Fenix and his team at the Basil Hetzel Institute for Translational Health Research have received a Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) Clinical Trial Grant for 2026 to 2028, funding a pilot study known as IMPACT-CRC, short for A Pilot Study for the Implementation of Cytokine-Induced Killer Cell Therapy for Metastatic Colorectal Cancer.
From cellular atlas to clinical trial
Bowel cancer is the fourth most commonly diagnosed cancer in Australia and, after lung cancer, the second leading cause of cancer death. For patients whose cancer has spread, treatment options can be limited, which is what makes new approaches so important.
Cytokine-induced killer (CIK) cell therapy takes a different approach to a standard drug treatment. A small blood sample is taken from the patient, and in the laboratory those immune cells are grown and primed to recognise and attack cancer cells, before being returned to the patient alongside their standard chemotherapy.
When Cure Cancer funded Dr Fenix's research in its early stages, his team was working to understand exactly which components of CIK therapy drive its anti-cancer effect, building what he described as a cellular “atlas” of the treatment. It is the unglamorous, foundational science that is often hardest to attract funding for, and without which a clinical trial like this one could never begin.
What the trial will test
The IMPACT-CRC pilot study will be delivered at The Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Adelaide, in collaboration with the University of Padova and Istituto Oncologico Veneto in Italy, among the few centres in the world with direct experience running CIK cell trials. Patients in the trial will receive standard chemotherapy together with four infusions of their own laboratory-expanded CIK cells.
Over the course of the trial, the team will assess whether the treatment can be safely and practically delivered as part of routine care, how many patients are suitable for it, whether they are able to complete the full treatment course, the best dosing schedule, and whether any treatment-related side effects occur. The findings will provide the evidence needed to plan larger trials aimed at improving outcomes for people living with metastatic bowel cancer.
Dr Kevin Fenix and team. Image: supplied
Dr Fenix is joined on the project by Prof Timothy Price, Dr Yoko Tomita and Dr Eric Smith from the Solid Tumour Group at the Basil Hetzel Institute, and Prof Guy Maddern from the Surgical Science Research Group, along with collaborators Professor Antonio Rosato, Roberta Sommaggio and Elisa Cappuzzello from the University of Padova and Istituto Oncologico Veneto.
Why it matters
Every year, Cure Cancer backs the researchers and ideas we believe are on the cusp of something extraordinary, long before anyone else is willing to. Most of that work happens quietly in laboratories, years before the rest of the world takes notice.
"Cure Cancer was one of the first organisations to back my research as an early career scientist," Dr Fenix says, "Their support gave me the opportunity to generate the preliminary data and build the collaborations needed to establish this clinical trial in Australia."
It is proof that a grant, given at the right moment, can help carry a bold idea all the way to the people it is meant to help. It is also a reminder that this kind of progress is rarely the work of one gift or one year of giving. It is built by a community of supporters giving steadily over time, who make it possible for Cure Cancer to keep saying yes to researchers like Kevin when their ideas are still just ideas.
Congratulations to Dr Fenix and the whole IMPACT-CRC team. We cannot wait to see what this trial discovers.
What if the next emerging researcher's bold idea is the one that changes everything? Your support could be the reason it gets its start.
