Well known for battling on behalf of sufferers of the disease in the courts, legal firm Slater and Gordon donated $150,000 to the Ballarat Cancer Research Centre.

Slater and Gordon's Suzanne Sanford made the presentation at the centre as part of a function to thank its financial supporters over the last 12 months.

It is the largest single donation made from the firm's Asbestos Research Fund, set up in 2004, and the only donation made to a regional Victorian institution, Ms Sanford said.

BCRC director Dr George Kannourakis said the money would go towards world first research into individualised chemotherapy drugs related to mesothelioma and lung cancer.

"The major excitment for the centre is the setting up of a new method for testing selected chemotherapy drugs in lung cancer patients and mesothelioma patients before they have treatment," Dr Kannourakis said

Th testing will be conducted in conjunction with a group in the United Kingdom and will be carried out over the next two years, he said.

Slater and Gordon's connection to the centre came about through the firm's representation of Bruce Stafford, who succumbed to mesothelioma in 2006.

His wife and BCRC board director Julie Stafford approached them with a funding request for the centre, which was approved recently.

Ms Stafford said the firm's donation and those of a range of individuals and groups had helped establish the only independent cancer research centre in Australia.

"Because we're independent it allows us to do any work we think is worthwhile. The research we have chosen to do is extremely innovative and forward thinking," Ms Stafford said.