The nation's largest cancer center is launching a massive "moonshot" effort against eight specific forms of the disease, similar to the all-out push for space exploration 50 years ago.

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston expects to spend as much as $3 billion on the project over the next 10 years and already has "tens of millions" of dollars in gifts to jump start it now, said its president, Dr. Ronald DePinho.

One of the cancers is myelodysplastic syndrome. "Good Morning America" co-anchor Robin Roberts has that kind and had a bone marrow transplant to treat it on Thursday. The others are especially deadly forms of breast and ovarian cancer, along with lung, prostate, melanoma and two types of leukemia.

The project aims to find cures and lower deaths. Although no overall benchmarks have been set, individual projects for various cancers have specific goals.

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