内容来源：https://www.geekwire.com/2025/how-fred-hutch-rose-from-scrappy-roots-to-global-cancer-pioneer-but-giant-funding-cuts-loom/

内容总结：

【西雅图讯】在人类抗癌史上留下革命性印记的弗雷德·哈钦森癌症研究中心（Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center）本月迎来成立50周年里程碑。这家拥有6000名员工的顶尖机构不仅以诺贝尔奖级突破重塑癌症治疗格局，更孕育了朱诺治疗、适应性生物技术等50家衍生企业，使西雅图跻身全球生物科技重镇。

回溯1974年创立之初，中心首席副主任弗雷德·阿佩尔鲍姆博士见证团队将唐纳尔·托马斯博士的骨髓移植设想转化为现实疗法。尽管早期治愈率仅15%且治疗过程艰难，这项斩获1990年诺贝尔奖的突破最终成为血癌患者的生命曙光。从年接诊百人到如今服务5万患者，该中心更推动CAR-T细胞疗法等创新技术发展，被宾夕法尼亚大学癌症中心主任罗伯特·冯德海登誉为"赢得诺贝尔奖的创新圣地"。

然而辉煌之下暗藏隐忧。特朗普政府拟将科研间接费用补贴上限砍至15%（现为76%），恐使中心年损失1.25亿美元资助。中心主任汤姆·林奇警告此举将对研究能力造成"毁灭性打击"。尽管拥有亚马逊创始人贝佐斯家族7.1亿美元等民间捐赠，阿佩尔鲍姆坦言已出现裁员及招聘延迟，但强调"历经三次经济衰退的我们必能再次突围"。

面对未来，科学家们正转向更系统的协同研究模式。通过基因测序技术革新与跨机构数据共享，阿佩尔鲍姆预言十年内将实现癌症防治范式转型："年度体检中通过血液检测早期发现肿瘤，切除后接种疫苗实现永久防护——这才是根治癌症的终极路径。"（完）

中文翻译：

弗雷德·哈金森癌症研究中心本月正迎来成立五十周年庆典。该机构的研究发现从根本上改变了癌症治疗模式，并使西雅图地区发展成为生物科技重镇。弗雷德·阿普尔鲍姆博士几乎从创院之初就在此工作。

作为该机构肿瘤学家兼执行副总裁，阿普尔鲍姆回忆了这个非营利组织早年的艰难岁月——当时他们正尝试将唐纳尔·托马斯博士关于骨髓移植的大胆设想转化为可行疗法。这项努力最终获得成功，如今拥有六千名员工的弗雷德·哈金森中心正以其开创精神激励着新一代癌症研究者的雄心。

"历史上的成功告诉我们，我们曾经做到过，就应该能再次做到。"阿普尔鲍姆接受GeekWire采访时表示，"这种信念已深植于哈金森中心的精神基因。"该机构的科研成果已孵化出朱诺治疗、适应性生物技术等50家衍生企业。

"弗雷德·哈金森癌症研究中心是传奇性的科研机构，对癌症患者的治疗进展至关重要。"美国国家癌症研究所前所长、FDA前代理局长诺曼·夏普勒斯博士通过邮件表示。宾夕法尼亚大学艾布拉姆森癌症中心主任罗伯特·冯德海登博士补充道："其声誉和影响力如此深入人心，业内提及皆称'哈金森'——这意味着诺奖级发现与创新，意味着改变癌症患者命运的科研成果。"

尽管过往成就与近期突破带来发展动能，该中心仍面临严峻新挑战。特朗普政府为提升政府效率正削减科研经费，联邦机构不仅取消多项资助，还计划限制用于支付公用事业费、租金等间接成本的拨款。中心主任汤姆·林奇博士今年早些时候警告称，削减间接成本支持将"对科研能力产生冰冷、剧烈且可怕的影响"。

阿普尔鲍姆本月则展现出韧性姿态，指出该中心曾挺过三次经济衰退与重大资金削减，创院岁月本身就是研究者毅力的试金石。

1990年，托马斯因骨髓移植开创性工作获诺贝尔奖，但早期实验对医患双方都充满艰辛。参与研究的都是别无选择的危重患者，治疗需在二战遗留的地下掩体中进行放射治疗。据阿普尔鲍姆回忆，当时治愈率仅15%。"患者带着求生希望入院，家人期盼奇迹发生，但移植毒性或疾病复发常导致悲剧。"他在2015年访谈中如是说。

随着疗法完善，治疗效果逐步提升，患者最终战胜癌症。"这令人无比振奋，"阿普尔鲍姆说，"他们真正从死亡边缘被拯救回来。"研究人员进一步发现骨髓移植可治疗镰状细胞病等遗传疾病，通过证明基因改造免疫细胞及创建识别恶性肿瘤受体的能力，推动了CAR-T细胞疗法的诞生。"整个基因治疗革命，"阿普尔鲍姆强调，"都源于托马斯在骨髓移植领域的初始发现。"

五十年来，该中心年接诊患者从百人增至今年五万名，治疗范围覆盖各类癌症。夏普勒斯指出，哈金森中心的科学家和临床医生"在肿瘤免疫学、癌症病毒学及骨髓移植等多领域做出关键发现"，并强调"若非该机构的重大突破，当今世上数以千计的癌症患者将无法存活"绝非夸张。

阿普尔鲍姆表示，随着癌症护理演进，科研方式也同步发展：过去依靠偶然突破开辟新领域，如今科学遵循循序渐进的系统化路径；技术促成的跨机构合作与数据共享正加速科研成果产出；实验室技术与计算能力进步使研究者能解析复杂细胞相互作用；尽管大型科研基础设施成本高昂，但DNA测序和治疗性抗体生产等操作成本已大幅降低。

面对这些进步，治愈癌症的宏伟目标是否更近了？"我们正在攻克多种癌症，"阿普尔鲍姆坦言胰腺癌和胶质母细胞瘤等仍难治愈，"但这并非不可逾越。"他坚信未来十年将继续揭示当前疗法失效的深层机制。

当前核心问题在于科研资金筹措。该中心去年获美国国立卫生研究院3.05亿美元资助，在华盛顿州仅次于华盛顿大学。但特朗普政府提议将间接成本补偿上限设为15%（远低于当前76%的比例），这将导致中心每年减少约1.25亿美元资助。尽管通过司法诉讼和国会审议争取缓解，影响已然显现：招聘延迟、裁员实施，机构需投入精力研判各种可能前景。

除政府资助外，该中心还获得亚马逊创始人贝索斯家族十年期7.1亿美元捐赠，以及大学村业主斯隆夫妇增至1亿美元的赠款。尽管资金存在不确定性，阿普尔鲍姆仍构想出癌症治疗的终极场景：民众年度体检时通过无痛采血进行癌症筛查，一旦发现异常即切除早期肿瘤并接种疫苗，"肿瘤永不复发——这便是我们治愈癌症的方式。"

英文来源：

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center — an organization responsible for discoveries that have fundamentally transformed cancer treatment and helped to establish the Seattle area as a biotech hub — is celebrating its founding 50 years ago this month.
Dr. Fred Appelbaum has been there since nearly day one.
Appelbaum, a Fred Hutch oncologist and executive vice president, recalls the early, scrappier days of the nonprofit as it was trying to turn Dr. Donnall Thomas’ bold ideas about bone marrow transplants into viable treatments. The effort ultimately worked and Fred Hutch is now a 6,000-employee institution that draws on its origins to inspire the next generation of ambitious cancer research.
“That history of success tells us that we did it before, and we should be able to do it again,” Appelbaum told GeekWire. “That’s embedded in the personality of the Hutch.”
The organization’s discoveries have led to 50 spinoff companies including Juno Therapeutics, Adaptive Biotechnologies and Affini-T Therapeutics.
“The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center is a storied research institution that has been key to the progress for patients with cancer,” said Dr. Norman Sharpless, a past director of the National Cancer Institute and former acting commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, via email.
Added Dr. Robert Vonderheide, director of the Abramson Cancer Center at Penn Medicine, regarding Fred Hutch: “Its reputation and impact are so well-known and cherished that everyone in our field simply says ‘The Hutch.’ We know what that means: Nobel-winning discovery and innovation, and science and treatments that make a difference for patients with cancer.”
But even as past accomplishments and recent breakthroughs are driving momentum, Fred Hutch faces daunting new challenges. The Trump administration is working to slash research dollars in an effort to boost government efficiency. Federal leaders have canceled grants and want to cap overhead funding that pays for utilities, rent and other so-called indirect costs.
Fred Hutch president and director Dr. Tom Lynch warned earlier this year that the administration’s cuts to overhead support “would have a chilling, dramatic, horrific effect on our ability to do research.”
Appelbaum struck a tone of resiliency this month, noting that Fred Hutch has survived three recessions and significant funding cuts — and the founding years themselves were a test of the researchers’ mettle.
Brought back from ‘the jaws of death’
In 1990, Thomas won a Nobel Prize for his pioneering work on bone marrow transplants, but the initial experiments were often harrowing for the doctors, nurses and leukemia patients alike. Only very sick patients with limited alternatives enrolled in the studies, which included radiation treatments delivered in underground bunkers from World War II. Cure rates were around 15%, Appelbaum previously recounted.
“[T]ime and again you’d have patients come in with hopes that they could be saved, and their family hoped that they could be saved, and unfortunately the toxicity of the transplant caused them to die or the disease came back,” he said in a 2015 interview.
But as the therapy was fine-tuned, outcomes improved and the patients beat their cancer.
“That was incredibly exhilarating,” Appelbaum said. “They’d been brought back literally from the jaws of death.”
From there, the researchers made additional discoveries, realizing that bone marrow transplants could treat certain genetic ailments, such as sickle cell disease. Fred Hutch studies helped spur CAR-T cell treatments by demonstrating the ability to genetically manipulate immune cells and create receptors that recognize malignant cancers.
“This whole revolution in gene therapy,” said Appelbaum, was derived from Thomas’ initial observations in marrow transplantation.
Over the decades, the center has gone from treating a 100 patients annually to serving 50,000 patients this year for wide-ranging cancers.
Fred Hutch scientists and clinicians have made essential discoveries “in diverse topics from tumor immunology to cancer virology to bone marrow transplantation,” said Sharpless, who is now professor of Cancer Policy and Innovation at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine.
“It would not be an exaggeration,” he added, “to say that many thousands of people who were once diagnosed with cancer are alive today because of critical discoveries at the FHCC.”
Evolving approach to research
As cancer care has evolved the nature of the work has likewise progressed, Appelbaum said. That includes a variety of changes:

• The past was notable for serendipitous breakthroughs that opened new fields. Today’s science follows a more methodical path of incremental advances that build logically upon each other.
• Tech-facilitated collaborations and data sharing across institutions are more rapidly unlocking discoveries.
• Advances in lab technology and computing allow researchers to “interrogate” complex cellular interactions to understand the mechanics of cancer.
• Research requires more costly infrastructure that is typically limited to large institutions, but advances have made many operations much cheaper, such as sequencing DNA or producing therapeutic antibodies.
  With these gains, is the moonshot of curing cancer getting closer?
  “We are curing lots of cancers.” Appelbaum said, while acknowledging that some, such as pancreatic cancer and glioblastomas, remain difficult to treat.
  “But that doesn’t mean that they are insurmountable,” he said. When it comes to those diseases, he added, “I firmly believe that we will, over the next decade, continue to unravel all the reasons why our current therapies, which should work, don’t work.”
  ‘That’s how we’ll cure cancer’
  The question now is how the work will be funded. Fred Hutch received $305 million of National Institutes of Health funding last year — second only to the University of Washington among NIH recipients in the state.
  But the Trump administration has proposed capping indirect cost payments at 15%, far below Fred Hutch’s current 76% rate. That change would wipe out roughly $125 million in annual support for the center, whose operating budget was $2.1 billion last year.
  Appelbaum acknowledged that U.S. research institutions could make fiscal improvements, but the nonprofit is worried. While the cuts are being fought in court and Congress is still weighing in, impacts are already being felt.
  Hiring is being delayed and the organization is investing time and energy exploring different potential outcomes, Appelbaum said. The center has made layoffs, but declined to confirm how many.
  “We’re very, very, very concerned, but we don’t know right now what is going to happen,” he added.
  Fred Hutch also has support from philanthropic giving, which includes $710 million from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his family that’s being issued over a decade, and a gift from Stuart and Molly Sloan, owners of University Village, that was recently increased to $100 million.
  Despite funding uncertainties, Appelbaum still can imagine how cancer care hits its moonshot. He envisions people coming in for their annual physical, having a painless blood sample taken, and providers looking for any hints of cancer.
  If something is detected, “we’ll remove that early tumor, and we’ll vaccinate you,” he said. “The tumor will never come back. That’s how we’ll cure cancer.”