They have sequenced >32k patients across several dozen cancer types.
Here's their getting started guide: https://docs.gdc.cancer.gov/Data_Portal/Users_Guide/Getting_...
cancer mutations are a complex thing. It's not as simple as: linear function(vector_of_mutations) -> perfect diagnosis of cancer type.
Perhaps these databases would be more useful if drug companies were allowed to put new drugs forward faster.
Tissue is extremely limited. The volume required to do testing shreds through the volume of tissue removed during biopsy very quickly, leaving limited amounts left over for study. As a result, access to cancerous tissue samples is actually a tremendous limiter on this type of research. In a company I worked on prior which was developing analogous technology, our ability to access a number of university affiliated tissue banks was a key differentiation between us and the competition.
https://www.mskcc.org/msk-impact
Right now it's a complement to the traditional surgical pathology route, and only about 70% accurate, but when surg path and molecular differ, it means extra steps are taken to confirm and hopefully get it absolutely right.
https://cancergenome.nih.gov/newsevents/newsannouncements/sa...
FWIW though, people have already been able to predict treatment outcome from mutation profile. Turns out the hard part is picking up on mutations present in only a tiny subset of the tumor.
http://www.newsweek.com/can-hiv-denying-scientist-cure-cance...
It'd be pretty funny if he turned out to be correct.
It's also important to remember that we know some cancers (leukemia for instance) are diploid and rarely develop anueploidy.
1. Understand the handful of oncagenes and their mutations that lead to cancer.
2. Sequence every patient's cancer
3. Work on finding drugs like herceptin that nullify the mutations exhibited by the patient.
4. Craft drug cocktails tailored to the patients specific mutations.
5. (In future) - edit the mutation code directly with something like CRISPR.
Diagnostic and screening advances are so useful because plenty of these cancers and cancer related disorders run subclinically, and many of them cause lasting systemic damage even after the rogue cell population is decimated.
Certainly helpful, but not the end of the fight.