Three new Specialized Programs of Research Excellence (SPORE) grants totaling $12.75 million for leukemia, $10.4 million for endometrial and $4.7 million for pancreatic cancer research have been awarded to the institution. M. D. Anderson also received $6.5 million in renewed funding for its lung cancer SPORE, first awarded in 1996. All four grants have been awarded to the institution in the last quarter.
With the addition of the new, five-year grants, M. D. Anderson now holds a total of eight NCI-sponsored SPOREs and ranks first in the number of grants received nationwide by the NCI.
M. D. Anderson's eight SPORE grants over the past seven years total more than $88 million. Before the new $6.5 million renewed award to M. D. Anderson, the grant for lung cancer research was originally given jointly to M. D. Anderson and the UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas in 1996. A second, $10 million SPORE grant for ovarian cancer research was awarded in 1999. In 2001, M. D. Anderson received both prostate and bladder SPORE grants, totaling $13.3 million and $13 million respectively making it the first institution to hold two such genitourinary cancer grants. A $12 million grant for head and neck cancer was awarded to the institution in 2002.
"We are grateful that M. D. Anderson has again been recognized by the NCI for its innovative and productive interdisciplinary research efforts," says John Mendelsohn, M.D., president of M. D. Anderson. "With these three new SPORE grants for leukemia, endometrial and pancreatic cancers, as well as renewed funding for our lung cancer SPORE, we will continue to build on our collaborative approa
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Contact: Laura Sussman
lsussman@mdanderson.org
713-745-2457
University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center
13-Oct-2003