The Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology was founded on a simple but powerful belief: meaningful progress against cancer requires large-scale, multidisciplinary collaboration that brings together scientists, clinicians, patients, research professionals, and institutions to connect scientific discovery to clinical practice.
Our vision
We seek to reduce the impact of cancer on people by uniting a broad community of scientists and clinicians from many disciplines, committed to discovering, validating and disseminating effective strategies for the prevention and treatment of cancer.
Our mission
To reduce the impact of cancer by:
- Conducting high-quality, multidisciplinary cancer prevention, control, and treatment clinical trials through a comprehensive national research network
- Advancing understanding of the biological basis of cancer and its treatment, from discovery through validation to clinical application
- Providing the scientific, operational, and data infrastructure needed to support innovative clinical and translational research across academic and community settings
Foundations that shaped the Alliance
The Alliance was created in 2011 through the merger of three former National Cancer Institute-funded cooperative groups: Cancer and Leukemia Group B (CALGB), the North Central Cancer Treatment Group (NCCTG), and the American College of Surgeons Oncology Group (ACOSOG). Each Group had achieved significant success independently, but their strengths were highly complementary. Together, they brought 65 years of collective experience and a continuum of cancer research spanning prevention, treatment, and survivorship.
The decision to merge the three groups reflected a strategic recognition that advancing oncology research required greater integration across disciplines and a more unified national infrastructure for clinical trials. By combining complementary scientific portfolios, operational systems, and investigator networks, the Alliance created an integrated organization equipped to conduct complex, large-scale clinical trials and generate evidence to advance cancer care.
The merge brought together the strengths and expertise of each legacy Group while enabling a more coordinated approach to setting research priorities, developing clinical trials, and translating findings into practice.