Gene synergy landscapes of breast and prostate cancer

描述(由申请人提供)：2009年《美国复苏和再投资法案》的目的是创造就业机会，并为NIH奖项提供资金，以资助追求改善美国公民生活时间和质量的科学，同时刺激经济。这项申请建议罗切斯特大学医学中心(URMC)招募一个在癌症基因组学和表观遗传学方面拥有成熟专业知识的新的转化型癌症研究团队。这个研究小组由目前在哥伦比亚大学贝斯特实验室担任助理研究员的约翰·爱德华兹博士领导，最初将由至少四个人组成，全部受雇 在新创造的就业机会中。值得注意的是，爱德华兹博士目前持有处于K99阶段的K99/R00过渡奖。爱德华兹博士访问了URMC，并与教职员工讨论了共同的研究兴趣。认识到URMC富有成效的合作以及科学和学术发展的前景，他承诺接受生物医学遗传学系的终身教职跟踪助理教授职位，如果通过这项申请获得资金的话。URMC拥有一支充满活力的、跨学科和多部门的科学家团队，在URMC詹姆斯·P·威尔莫特癌症中心的保护伞下从事多方面的转化性癌症研究。利用先进的基因组资源将癌症基因组功能与表观遗传标记(如人类癌症DNA甲基化)联系起来的能力是一个具有提高癌症诊断和预后预测的巨大潜力的新兴领域。癌症表观遗传学方面的专业知识将显著加强和补充我们现有的转译癌症研究能力。爱德华兹博士加入教职还将促进基因组学专业知识的发展，与新成立的基因组学与系统生物学中心和生物医学遗传学系直接相关，后者是爱德华兹教授职位的核心中心和学术中心。在这里，我们描述了爱德华兹博士的研究计划，以及它如何适应URMC詹姆斯·P·威尔莫特癌症中心、生物医学遗传学部门以及基因组学和系统生物学中心的转化型癌症研究工作。此外，我们还讨论了爱德华兹博士将如何从生物医学遗传学系和詹姆斯·P·威尔莫特癌症中心的科学环境和指导文化中受益。 公共卫生相关性：本文描述的多学科转化研究计划将使用实验和计算方法识别乳腺癌全基因组甲基化模式的变化，并评估它们作为癌症诊断和疾病复发预后的生物标记物的有效性。

DESCRIPTION (Provided by the applicant): The purpose of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 is to create jobs, and for NIH awards to fund science in pursuit of improving the length and the quality of the lives of U.S. citizens, while at the same time stimulating the economy. This application proposes a new translational cancer research team with established expertise in cancer genomics and epigenetics to be recruited to the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC). This research team lead by Dr. John Edwards, presently a research associate in the Bestor laboratory at Columbia University, would initially consist of at least four individuals, all employed in newly created jobs. Notably, Dr. Edwards currently holds an active K99/R00 transition award that is in its K99 stage. Dr. Edwards has visited URMC and discussed common research interests with the faculty. Recognizing the perspectives for fruitful collaborations, and for scientific and academic growth at URMC, he is committed to accept a tenure track Assistant Professor position in the Department of Biomedical Genetics, should funds through this application become available. URMC hosts a vibrant, interdisciplinary and multidepartment team of scientists working on multiple aspects of translational cancer research under the umbrella of the James P. Wilmot Cancer Center at URMC. The ability to use advanced genomic resources to associate cancer genome function with epigenetic marks, e.g. methylation on DNA of human cancers is an emerging area with great potential to improve cancer diagnostics and outcome prediction. Expertise in cancer epigenetics would markedly strengthen and complement our existing translational cancer research capabilities. Addition of Dr. Edwards to the faculty would also advance genomics expertise with direct relevance to the newly founded Center for Genomics and Systems Biology and the Department of Biomedical Genetics, as the core center and academic home for his faculty position. Herein we describe Dr. Edwards's research plan and how it fits into the context of the translational cancer research efforts at the James P. Wilmot Cancer Center at URMC, the Department of Biomedical Genetics and the Center for Genomics and Systems Biology. Furthermore we discuss how Dr. Edwards would benefit from the scientific environment and the mentoring culture of the Department of Biomedical Genetics, and the James P. Wilmot Cancer Center. Public Health Relevance: The multidisciplinary translational research program described in here will identify alterations in genome-wide methylation patterns in breast cancer using experimental and computational methods and assess their utility as biomarkers for cancer diagnosis and prognosis of disease recurrence.