Cancer Frontier Fund Supports Nine New Cancer Research Projects

We are pleased to announce that the Cancer Frontier Fund at The Foundation for Barnes-Jewish Hospital recently funded nine new projects through the Siteman Investment Program (SIP), a research grant program at Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine. In total, SIP awarded $1.89 million from a variety of sources, including more than $1 million from the Cancer Frontier Fund and other cancer research funds at the Foundation. The Cancer Frontier Fund includes gifts from generous donors made throughout the year, and through the Foundation’s annual Illumination Gala and Pedal the Cause’s annual bike challenge. 

SIP is a biannual, highly competitive, peer-reviewed grant program designed to accelerate innovation in cancer research. These grants provide researchers with the opportunities to gather critical evidence necessary to compete for larger federal funding. Often, this early-stage funding determines the ability, success, and rate at which scientific discoveries can progress from an early idea to patient care and treatment. For more than 15 years, the Cancer Frontier Fund has supported over 185 promising cancer research projects through SIP. And, for every dollar of philanthropic support, SIP recipients leverage an additional $13 from national funding to expand and accelerate research.  

Projects receiving SIP awards include:

New Clinical Trial

• A Phase Ib Study Evaluating the Safety and Tolerability of Sipuleucel-T (Sip-T) in Combination With an N-803 in Patients With Metastatic Castrate- Resistant Prostate Cancer (mCRPC)
  Principal Investigator: Russell Pachynski, MD
  Co-Principal Investigator: Daniel Thorek, PhD

Preliminary Research (Pre-R01)

• Mechanisms Driving Obesogenic Diet-Accelerated Gliomagenesis in NF1
  Principal Investigator: Nicole Brossier, MD, PhD
   
• Enhancing CAR T-cell Therapy for Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma
  Principal Investigator: John DiPersio, MD, PhD
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• Targeting Myeloid-Biased Multipotent Progenitor To Rebalance Lineage Output in MPNs
  Principal Investigator: Yoon-A Kang, PhD

• Targeting HOXB13 Mediated Immune Suppression of Prostate Cancer
  Principal Investigator: Kiran Mahajan, PhD
  Co-Principal Investigator: Nupam Mahajan, PhD

• Regulation of Hematopoietic Stem Cell Metabolism by Stathmin 1
  Principal Investigator: Laura Schuettpelz, MD, PhD

• Defining How the Role of DDIT4 in Mitochondrial Metabolism and Turnover Impacts Chemotherapy Responses in Acute Myeloid Leukemia
  Principal Investigator: Stephen Sykes, PhD

• Rescuing BRCA1 Haploinsufficieny and DNA Replication Fork Stability With Antisense Oligonucleotides
  Principal Investigator: Alessandro Vindigni, PhD
  Co-Principal Investigator: Sergej Djuranovic, PhD

• Modulating TP53 Activity To Target Splicing Factor-Mutant Blood Cancers
  Principal Investigator: Matthew Walter, MD

Availability of funding often determines the rate at which scientific discoveries can progress from an early idea to patient care and treatment, making your support critical to ensure the fund is replenished and that each generation has access to the most innovative therapies.

Kian-Huat Lim, MD, PhD, a WashU research scientist and physician at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, received a SIP award of nearly $160,000 in 2006 to investigate the potential of deactivating the immune defense mechanism of pancreatic cancer cells. Three subsequent SIP awards later, Dr. Lim has procured three National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants for a combined $8.1 million with his work featured in dozens of publications, and he currently co-leads a $10.9 million SPORE grant from the National Cancer Institute—one of only three pancreatic SPORE projects in the country. “When we apply for funding from the National Cancer Institute, we need to provide a lot of data to show our hypothesis or experiment will work,” Dr. Lim says. “That’s where private philanthropy comes in.” Funding from the Cancer Frontier Fund, through SIP grants, continues to make invaluable impact by supporting research scientists and physicians along the spectrum of research, from preliminary research to clinical trials.

Make a gift to the Cancer Frontier Fund today.  

Additional SIP Funding  
In addition to gifts to the Cancer Frontier Fund at The Foundation for Barnes-Jewish Hospital, further support for SIP comes from the Cancer Center Support Grant from the National Cancer Institute, the Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Research Fund, and various philanthropic gifts to Siteman Cancer Center.