NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – The Case Comprehensive Cancer Center's federal grant has been renewed for five years at more than $23 million from the National Cancer Institute , it announced on Thursday.
Case CCC, one of 41 centers across the US designated by NCI as a comprehensive care center, comprises Case Western Reserve University, which serves as its host, the Cleveland Clinic, and University Hospital Case Medical Center. It has held NCI designation for 25 years and received comprehensive status in 1998.
The center was endorsed for about $25 million in funding as part of the renewal review, a figure that was determined based on the final year of its previous grant. The federal government's sequestration resulted in a 6.5 percent reduction, however, though the center said that funding could return to approved levels in coming years.
Research is conducted at Case CCC through 15 shared resources including core facilities that provide access to equipment for studies in genomics, biostatistics, cytometry, and imaging microscopy. In 2012, participating institutions in the center received more than $115 million in cancer-related research, it said.
Its cancer genetics program, led by Sanford Markowitz and Robert Elston, is organized around three focus areas, according to its website: the elucidation of the role of tumor suppressor genes and oncogenes; identification of susceptibility genes, and the development of molecular assays for the early detection and assessment of a person's risk for developing cancer; and development of new methods and model systems for discovering cancer-causing genes while advancing cancer genetics to clinical cancer care.
While the program has concentrated on gastrointestinal cancers, especially colon cancers and adenocarcinomas of the esophagus, work at Case CCC also has resulted in "significant advances" in the understanding other tumors, such as human sarcomas, brain tumors, and breast tumors, the center said.