The Arizona Cancer Center at the University of Arizona has received, in partnership with two other institutions, a coveted grant from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to accelerate the translation of laboratory research on lymphoma into improved care for patients. The grant, part of the NCI's Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) program, is only the fifth for lymphoma research to be awarded nationwide.

Thomas Miller, director of the Arizona Cancer Center Lymphoma Program, and Richard Fisher, director of the University of Rochester's James P. Wilmot Cancer Center, are two of the principal investigators for the SPORE grant. Dr. Miller and Dr. Fisher have worked together for 25 years as part of the Southwest Oncology Group, an NCI-supported collaborative organization that conducts cancer clinical trials.

"We have worked together designing clinical trials to improve treatment for patients with lymphoma, and together we have established many of the standard therapies used in the treatment of lymphoma," Dr. Miller said. "The internationally renowned lymphoma research groups in this SPORE complement each other's abilities and this will advance productivity. This SPORE award reflects the belief that this partnership will be synergistic."

UA and Rochester, the grant's lead institution, will investigate how to cause lymphoma-cell death, seek to prove the existence of lymphoma stem cells, and target a cell-cycle regulator of lymphoma growth. Steven Grant, associate director of translational research at Virginia Commonwealth University's Massey Cancer Center, will lead a related study examining ways to improve the effectiveness of the lymphoma drug bortezomib.

"With this grant, we will rapidly increase our progress in the basic understanding of the disease, so we can develop new approaches to treatments for the thousands of people affected every year," said Dr. Fisher, who chairs the scientific advisory board of the Lymphoma Research Foundation. Dr. Miller is also a member of the board.

David Alberts, director of the Arizona Cancer Center, described the SPORE award as confirmation of UA's excellence in lymphoma research.

"Our lymphoma clinical-translational research team is the best in the world," Dr. Alberts said. "It has contributed greatly to an exquisite classification system based on histopathologic, immunologic, and genomic abnormality, which is ultimately hooked to prognosis and treatment selection."

The five-year grant is worth $11.5 million, of which UA will receive close to $3.5 million. UA is one of a handful of institutions with multiple SPORE grants. The Gastrointestinal Cancer Program at the Arizona Cancer Center recently received a five-year $12 million renewal of its SPORE grant.

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For more information:

University of Arizona news release, 09/08/2008

University of Rochester news release, 09/08/2008

Virginia Commonwealth University news release, 09/08/2008