Overview

The development of safe and effective therapeutic and diagnostic agents and the strategies to guide their use is essential to improving the care of cancer patients in our catchment area and beyond. The role of the Moores Cancer Center Solid Tumor Therapeutics Program (STT) is to use the enormously powerful new cellular, molecular and imaging tools now available to drive the development of treatment strategies that exploit unique tumor cell vulnerabilities. To accomplish this, STT brings together faculty who are experts in each stage of the development process in a collaborative endeavor to leverage new tools and technologies in pursuit of the development of novel therapeutics and to advance the diagnostic and biomarker tools needed to precisely direct their use.

The STT Program has 59 members across 16 departments with a wide range of cancer-relevant scientific disciplines and interests. STT has recruited an outstanding group of translational investigators who develop new therapeutics and technologies and clinician scientists who have the insight and experience to shape these into treatment strategies and introduce them into clinical trials. Accordingly, STT is composed of members whose expertise spans many disciplines including medicinal chemists, immunologists, stem cell biologists, radiation biologists, bioengineers and clinical investigators specializing in the design and execution of clinical trials in the disciplines of medical, surgical, gynecologic, pediatric, neuro- and radiation oncology, and cancer imaging. Research by STT members directly supports the MCC mission through bridging the laboratory to the clinic, translating new discoveries into clinical strategies, and vice versa. A significant number of STT members are physician-scientists who run NCI-funded laboratories as well as trials, with a particular focus on investigator-initiated trials (IITs). This naturally fosters extensive inter-programmatic collaborations, and interactions that cut across classical disciplines. Research by STT members has consistently served as the basis for translational and subsequent practice-changing trials. STT members have a proven track record of high-impact contributions, and during the project period, a significant upward trajectory of productivity as indicated by high-impact collaborative publications and translation of MCC science to IITs. The translational and clinical research efforts of STT members have direct relevance to the cancers with the highest rates of prevalence and mortality in MCC’s catchment area.

Program Goals

The overall goal of STT is to develop novel therapeutics and the biomarkers needed to individualize their use. The aims span the spectrum of basic to translational to clinical science: