November 3, 2020:

This month, the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium highlights the University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center as our featured member. Rogel Cancer Center member Ajjai Alva, MBBS, is an associate professor of hematology/oncology and member of the Big Ten CRC’s Genitourinary Clinical Trial Working Group. He has participated in four Big Ten CRC trials with a few more in the pipeline. Dr. Alva shares why he is glad to be part of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium.

“Cancer Research is evolving rapidly with major new advances and that’s great news for patients. From a researcher perspective, the fast-changing landscape makes it critical to get new trials up and running fast and to get them completed fast as well. Otherwise, we run a real risk of the study being outdated and irrelevant. The consortium provides a great platform of outstanding experienced institutions and investigators to do cutting-edge and fast-paced studies. The Administrative Headquarters team is outstanding, highly professional, and very responsive to site and investigator needs and ever ready to assist. Read More

September 9, 2020:

This month, the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium highlights the University of Wisconsin Carbone Cancer Center as our featured member. UW Carbone member Elisavet Paplomata, MD, an assistant professor in the Department of Medicine, shares her research interests and expertise in breast and gynecologic cancers in this story, originally published by uwhealth.org.

At the Intersection of Breast and Gynecologic Cancers: Dr. Elisavet Paplomata

Although gynecologic cancers are less common than breast cancer, the treatment of these cancers can be more challenging due to lack of effective screening and subsequent diagnosis at an advanced stage.

New UW Carbone Cancer Center member Elisavet Paplomata, MD, an assistant professor in the Department of Medicine, brings extensive clinical research experience in studying both breast and gynecologic cancers to UW-Madison. Her work focuses on finding new drug treatment options for women diagnosed with these diseases. Read More

August 1, 2020:

This month, the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium highlights Masonic Cancer Center, University of Minnesota, as our featured member. Veronika Bachanova, MD, PhD, shares her research interests, and Jeffrey Miller, MD, discusses his research in natural killer (NK) cells.

Investigator Spotlight

Veronika Bachanova, MD, PhD, professor of medicine, Masonic Cancer Center, University of Minnesota Medical School

Educational background

• Medical School: Komenius University, Bratislava, Slovakia
• Residency: Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit, Mich.
• Fellowship: University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minn.

Research interests

I am a professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota, section head of hematologic malignancy, and lead for CAR-T Cell Therapy in the Bone Marrow Transplant Program at University of Minnesota. My research and clinical work is focused on immunotherapies and stem cell transplantation for hematologic malignancies, particularly lymphoma. I founded and currently chair the Hematologic Malignancy Tissue Bank and have designed and conducted dozens of investigator-initiated clinical trials for lymphoma and leukemia. Read More

July 1, 2020:

Investigator Spotlight

Zeynep Madak-Erdogan, PhD, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Educational background

• PhD: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• BS: Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey

Research interests

I am the director of the Women’s Health, Hormones, and Nutrition lab at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. My research interests include the impact of nutrients and hormones on breast cancer outcomes, health disparities in African-American women with breast cancer, and the impact of estrogen receptor alpha and kinase signaling cross-talk on the development and progression of breast cancer. I am also interested in researching the effect of diet and nutrition, which are influenced by socioeconomic status, on hormone action and therapy effectiveness. Read More

June 1, 2020:

As New Jersey’s only National Cancer Institute (NCI)-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center, Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey’s team of internationally recognized physicians and researchers is driven by a singular focus and mission, to help individuals fight cancer. Through the transformation of laboratory discoveries into clinical practice, we target cancer with precision medicine, immunotherapy and clinical trials and provide the most advanced, comprehensive, and compassionate world-class cancer care to adults and children. This mission is being accomplished in partnership with RWJBarnabas Health. Rutgers Cancer Institute physicians and scientists work side by side to make sure the most sophisticated treatments are delivered to our patients quickly and safely – the future of cancer treatments today. Read More

May 1, 2020:

Since 1978, the Purdue University Center for Cancer Research has been a National Cancer Institute-designated basic research cancer center. Only seven institutions in the United States have earned this title. Being a basic research center means we don’t treat cancer patients directly. Our work focuses on investigating cancers where they begin — at the cellular level — to investigate the cause of and cure for one of the most devastating diseases of our time.

Doctors and scientists throughout the world use our discoveries to develop methods, medicines, and medical devices to save and enhance patients’ lives.

Learn more at: https://www.purdue.edu/cancer-research/.

Investigator Spotlight

Humaira Gowher, PhD, Purdue University Center for Cancer Research

Educational background

• PhD in Biochemistry: Justus Leibeg University, Germany
• MSc in Biochemistry: Aligarh Muslim University, India

Research interests

The overarching goal of our research is to elucidate epigenetic mechanisms that control cell identity and determine how these mechanisms are disrupted in cancer. Using embryonic stem cells and embryonal carcinoma cells as model systems, our research specifically focuses on the activity of distal regulatory elements of developmental genes, called enhancers, and insulators. We also study the effect of somatic mutations of DNA and histone methyltransferases commonly found in cancer and other developmental disorders on the biochemical activity of these enzymes. Read More

March 1, 2020:

Investigator Spotlight

Anita Turk, MD, Indiana University School of Medicine

Educational background

• MD: Indiana University School of Medicine
• Residency: University of Chicago
• Fellowship: University of Wisconsin

Research interests

I am a medical oncologist who treats gastrointestinal malignancies with a special focus on hepatobiliary cancers. My research focus is to develop targeted and immune-based therapies for my patients. Through Indiana University’s Precision Genomics Clinic, we have been able to sequence tumors to help us understand the biology and identify the best clinical trials within the Big Ten CRC for our patients. Read More

Jan. 7, 2020:

Investigator Spotlight:

Benjamin Teply, MD, University of Nebraska Medical Center

Research interests:

I am a medical oncologist engaged in clinical and translational research in genitourinary malignancies, with a special focus in prostate cancer. I have worked on novel treatment strategies for prostate cancer, with a focus on mechanisms other than suppression of androgen signaling, in both treatment-naïve (such as PARP inhibition) and castration-resistant prostate cancer (such as therapeutic high-dose testosterone). I am also dedicated in optimizing the use of approved therapies to maximize patient benefit. Read More

July 1, 2019:

Investigator Spotlight:

Imagine having surgery to remove a tumor, and by the time you’ve recovered from the operation, your oncologist has determined a specific drug regimen that is targeted to treat your cancer.

“If you get diagnosed with a bacterial infection, we take a culture, grow the bacteria in the lab, and treat the cultures with antibiotics,” said Dustin Deming, MD, a gastrointestinal oncologist and researcher with the UW Carbone Cancer Center. “This helps us learn what antibiotic will best treat an infection. Why can’t we do the same thing for cancer?”

Shifting “trial and error” treatment approaches from patients to cell cultures could spare patients time and unnecessary side effects while providing a personalized form of treatment.

The challenge to this approach has traditionally been the difficulty of growing cancer cells in the lab, but research in Deming’s lab, which focuses on gastrointestinal cancers, is overcoming this limitation. Read More

June 1, 2019:

Investigator Spotlight:

Robert Kratzke, MD, University of Minnesota

Research interests:

I am a medical oncologist with a particular interest in lung cancer and mesothelioma. In my laboratory we are currently looking at the use of viruses for cancer therapy. In particular, the vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) interests us as it preferentially infects cancer cells without causing disease in humans. We have shown that injecting the virus at one tumor will rapidly lead to infection in other tumor sites throughout the body. Also, the infection of the cancer cells not only kills malignant cells, it elicits an immune response that helps attack surrounding cancer cells without harming normal cells. Finally, this enhanced immune response makes the infected cancer cells more vulnerable to treatment with the modern immunotherapies such as pembroluzimab or nivolumab. In collaboration with Dr. Manish Patel we are currently running clinical studies at the UMMC using VSV. Read More