A NEW era of cancer treatment has dawned.

Scientists from research institutes in Australia, Canada, Japan, China and the UK will today release the first DNA profiles of some of the most prevalent types of tumours.

It is the first output from the International Cancer Genome Consortium of 12 institutes around the world working to map the genes of 50 different cancers.

The Queensland Centre for Medical Genomics at the University of Queensland's Institute of Molecular Bioscience is a member of the consortium and has released the analysed blueprints of two pancreatic tumours.

QCMG director and primary investigator Professor Sean Grimmond said the QCMG was mapping the pancreatic and ovarian tumours of 500 patients, while other institutes were tackling different common cancers, including lung, breast, blood, brain, kidney, liver and stomach.

"Over the last two decades we've worked out that cancer arises from the accumulation of genetic damage to the genome or genetic blueprint . . . once you've accumulated sufficient damage in key locations, tumours will develop," he said.