May 7, 2009--Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center members Philip Febbo, MD; Michael Morse, MD; and David Rizzieri, MD, were recently welcomed into the American Society for Clinical Investigation, an honor society of physician-scientists who translate findings in the laboratory to the advancement of clinical practice.

April 16, 2009--Elise Olsen, MD, a founding member, has just been elected first president of a newly formed physician-run organization, the United States Consortium for Cutaneous Lymphomas (USCCL). This is a multidisciplinary group with the goals of a national registry for cutaneous lymhomas and collaborative research.

April 1, 2009--Duke Comprehensive Center member Victoria Seewaldt, MD, and Dihua Yu of MD Anderson Cancer Center were jointly awarded a $7.5M, 5 year, Susan G. Komen Promise Grant. This is a multi-disciplinary, bench-to-bedside grant that aims to accelerate testing of targeted agents for breast cancer prevention. The Duke Team includes Neil Spector, MD; Lee Wilke, MD; Catherine Ibarra, PhD; William Barry, PhD; Stephanie Robertson; and Tonya Daye.

Terry Lechler, PhD, has won a Sidney Kimmel Scholars Award which provides research grants to the nation's most promising young cancer researchers. The goal of the grant program is to improve the basic understanding of cancer biology and to develop new methods for the prevention and treatment of cancer.

March 25, 2009

Cancer Center member Yiping Yang, MD, PhD, has recently been awarded three new grants. From the National Cancer Institute, he received a new RO1 grant in the amount of $1.56 million for five years for “Novel Strategies for Cancer Immunotherapy in Stem Cell Transplant”. From the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, he received a R21 grant in the amount of $429,000 for two years for his project “TLR Signaling in CD8 T Cell Response to Vaccinia Virus”, and a UO1 grant in the amount of $3 million for five years for his project “Mechanisms for NK Cell Activation in Vaccinia Virus Control”.