National Cancer Institute awards UCLA prostate cancer program an $8.7 million grant

The prostate cancer program at the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center and UCLA Health has been awarded an $8.7 million Specialized Program of Research Excellence, or SPORE, grant from the National Cancer Institute. The grant will support the development of new and innovative approaches for improving the diagnosis, prognosis and treatment of prostate cancer.The  2019 designation recognizes UCLA’s prostate cancer program as one of the best in the country and marks the fourth time it will be receiving the five-year cycle of funding. The program is one of only eight current such programs and the only one to be awarded the designation in the state of California.“For the past 15 years, the SPORE grant has played a pivotal role in bringing a sense of cohesiveness to our program,” said principal investigator of the grant Dr. Robert Reiter, professor of urology and director of the UCLA Prostate Cancer Program. “It funds projects that include researchers and scientists from diverse disciplines and backgrounds all around campus — such as chemistry, nanotechnology, radiology, pathology and stem cell biology — to help accelerate our goal of combating prostate cancer.”Under the leadership of Reiter, the grant has helped lead to significant discoveries that have had a major impact on how men with prostate cancer are treated. Most notably, the grant helped support the work of Dr. Michael Jung, a UCLA distinguished professor of chemistry and biochemistry, and Dr. Charles...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news