The V Foundation for Cancer Research, a top-rated cancer research charity, is pleased to announce it has awarded $25 million for cutting-edge cancer research in 2017 – bringing the total amount the Foundation has awarded to more than $200 million. The V Foundation’s world-class Scientific Advisory Committee, comprised of outstanding researchers from prominent cancer centers, oversees the grant-making process to ensure proposals meet the highest standards of scientific merit and the best scientists are funded nationwide.
In 2017, the V Foundation awarded 24 V Scholar Grants, designed to identify and advance innovative young scientists establishing their research careers. V Scholar Grants are $200,000, two-year commitments, providing the most promising researchers a competitive edge to earn additional funding from other sources. In connection with two of the V Foundation’s focus areas, three V Scholar Grants will fund pediatric cancer research and three are funded through the Stuart Scott Memorial Cancer Research Fund. V Scholars supported through the Stuart Scott Fund are early career investigators who are African American or Hispanic. V Scholar grant-funding areas included research for cancers of the lung, brain, prostate, endometrium, breast and skin, among others.
“As a new investigator, it is a tremendous honor to receive funding from the V Scholars program to establish a new project to understand antitumor immune responses,” said Philip Kranzusch, Ph.D. “Our lab uses a basic science approach to understand immune function at the molecular level. Support from the V Foundation is particularly exciting, as it will allow us to extend our studies beyond biochemistry and begin to explain how the basic principles we discover function during cellular responses to cancer.”
The V Foundation awarded 22 Translational Grants in 2017. These grants fund projects to bring cancer research from the bench to the bedside. Translational Grants are awards of $200,000 each year for three years. Two of these grants were funded through the Stuart Scott Memorial Cancer Research Fund, and four are funding pediatric cancer research. Translational Grants awarded through the Stuart Scott Fund support research dedicated to the aggressiveness, therapeutic responsiveness and ultimate outcomes experienced by cancer patients from diverse ethnic populations.
“Translational grants support the movement of new drugs and new concepts from the laboratory to the clinic and back again, testing human blood and cancer tissue from treated patients to determine what needs to be done to provide more effective treatment,” said Robert Bast, M.D., Vice President for Translational Research at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and Chair of the V Foundation’s Scientific Advisory Committee. “Like the V Scholar awards, some of these Translational Grants include several awards that focus on children and minorities.”
The V Foundation has a strict adherence to sound fiscal management and transparency. It holds a 4-star rating from Charity Navigator, America’s largest and most-utilized independent evaluator of charities, and is among the top 4% of evaluated cancer charities. The V Foundation holds a platinum rating on Guide Star.
Editor’s Notes: A complete list of the 2017 grant recipients can be found here.
