T32: Predoctoral and Postdoctoral Training Program in Nanotechnology for Cancer Research

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Project Summary The interface between nanotechnology and medicine is a new frontier for scientific exploration and for the creation of new and improved diagnostic and therapeutic tools to detect, treat, cure, and prevent human diseases. We propose to create an integrated predoctoral and postdoctoral training program in nanotechnology for cancer research (NTCR) that is positioned at this interface. It is based on two parent R25 and T32 training grants in the same area. This program will establish a unique national resource with interdisciplinary and synergistic programs in fundamental research in cancer biology, industrial collaboration, and translational research in cancer medicine. This program fosters predoctoral and postdoctoral fellows who are trained across disciplines to lay foundations for technologies that enable an inside-view of cancer cell functions as opposed to the limited black-box input-output techniques currently used, introduce new modalities for molecular imaging, develop new high-throughput diagnostic tools, and engineer novel drug/antibody/siRNA viral and non-viral delivery systems to treat human cancers. NTCR fellows develop novel cancer diagnostics to evaluate each individual patient's prognosis and optimal treatment, based upon the patients' genetic and epigenetic markers and disease phenotype and therapeutics that are selected and optimized for each individual patient. NTCR trainees take one of three core courses depending on their background, as well as a lab course in cancer nanobiotechnology. They participate in a journal club and a dedicated annual symposium, as well as clinical conferences and tumor boards. The NTCR program will recruit outstanding trainees every year with MD and/or PhD degrees and diverse backgrounds in either biochemistry, physics, molecular/cellular/cancer biology, or an engineering/physics discipline for a steady state number of 2 postdoctoral and 6 predoctoral fellows. The NTCR program lasts 3 years for postdoctoral trainees and 4-5 years for predoctoral trainees. NTCR fellows take advantage of research and clinical resources at the NCI-designated Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, the Ludwick Center for Cancer Genetics and Therapeutics, The Sol Goldman Pancreatic Cancer Center, and the In Vivo Cellular and Molecular Imaging Center, as well as the unique educational resources and experimental facilities of the recently established Johns Hopkins Institute for NanoBioTechnology (INBT), which previously housed the center for cancer nanotechnology excellence (CCNE) and currently the physical sciences-oncology center (PSOC).