MARCH 2023
 
IN THIS NEWSLETTER:

  • From the Cancer Consortium
  • New Funding Portal
  • Request for Information (RFI) on Existing Data Sharing Processes for NIH-Funded Research
  • CCSG Updates
  • Clinical Chemistry Call for Papers
  • Reminder: Please Help the Consortium Track Awards, Honors, and External Activities for Members!
  • In the Spotlight
  • Current Funding Opportunities
  • Save the Date - Upcoming Events
  • From the Office of Community Outreach & Engagement
  • From the Office of Faculty Affairs & Diversity
  • From the Office of Education & Training
  • Consortium Leader Close Up: Dr. McGarry Houghton
 

FROM THE CANCER CONSORTIUM

New Funding Portal

Moving forward, Consortium-sponsored funding competitions (including Pilot Awards and New Investigator Awards) will be conducted using InfoReady, a new centralized funding portal supported by the Fred Hutch Philanthropy Department's Foundations Relations team.

In addition to serving as the platform for Consortium-supported awards, this database will aggregate and unify other non-federal and Fred Hutch-specific funding opportunities, awards, and prize nominations. It will also streamline Fred Hutch internal award management and post-award reporting.

Note that although some awards (such as the Fred Hutch Limited Applicant Awards) are only available to Fred Hutch faculty, this portal is available to Consortium members at all institutions and at all career levels.

Visit the funding portal home page to create an account and start exploring funding opportunities, or use the filterable Engagement Hub to tailor your search for funding opportunities relevant to your research and eligibility.

Please contact fundingopp@fredhutch.org with any questions.

Request for Information (RFI) on Existing Data Sharing Processes for NIH-Funded Research

This Request for information (RFI) is intended to assist the NCI in understanding the existing processes and workflows of data storage, preservation, and sharing. Through this RFI, the NCI seeks to understand scientific data management in the cancer research community.

This RFI invites participation from stakeholders/staff across the cancer research enterprise: individual research laboratories, staff from scientific instrumentation core facilities, office of research or sponsored projects, office of provost, libraries, information technology and security, institutional review board, bioinformaticians and data scientists that assist in data curation, formatting, and analysis. All survey participants are encouraged to respond to as many questions as they are able, no matter their role in the research enterprise.

Responses are due by April 3, and can be submitted via this webform.

For more information, click here. 

CCSG Updates

As a reminder, the Cancer Center Support Grant (CCSG) Competing Renewal is due January of 2024. Check this section of the newsletter for CCSG-related updates and announcements, as well as a brief overview of what we're working on now.

  • Updates: the Cancer Consortium External Advisory Board (EAB) Meeting has been scheduled for Thursday, July 13, 2023.
  • Current projects:
  • Consortium leaders are continuing to work on drafting grant narratives for all Research Programs, Shared Resources, and Components
  • The Consortium Administration team is collecting, compiling, and sorting data on Consortium membership, clinical trials, grants, and publications

Clinical Chemistry Call for Papers

Clinical Chemistry is pleased to announce an upcoming special issue, "Cancer: Biology & Diagnostics." Potential topics of interest include:

  • Novel biomarkers in cancer screening
  • Biology and/or mechanisms of preneoplasia
  • Applications of machine learning in the screening or diagnosis of cancer
  • Dynamics of circulating tumor DNA, circulating tumor cells, and/or extracellular vesicles (exosomes) during cancer therapy
  • Biology and clinical implications of liquid biopsy analysis in monitoring minimal residual disease
  • Emerging laboratory technologies for cancer diagnosis
  • Clinical applications of cancer genomics
  • Novel insights into cancer from long-read sequencing
  • Applications of wearable or implantable analytical devices in cancer management

Please submit manuscripts to https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/clinchem by June 1, 2023.

Reminder: Please Help the Consortium Track Awards, Honors, and External Activities for Members!

For CCSG reporting purposes, the Consortium Administration Team will be tracking Consortium members' significant accomplishments and activities. Below are examples of the information we're collecting:

  • awards
  • membership/service on national committees
  • large grants
  • any activities or work that have resulted in significant changes to cancer research policies or paradigms OR that have had far-reaching impacts for cancer health equity
If any of your activities from the last grant period (2019-present) fall into the above categories, please use the form below to submit them. Thank you!
Use This Form to Report Activities

In the Spotlight

The following interinstitutional Cancer Consortium collaborations were included in recent editions of the Science Spotlight:

  • "The ins and outs of the tumor microbiome" featured collaborative work from Drs. Susan Bullman Pathogen Associated Malignancies), Christopher Johnston (Pathogen Associated Malignancies), Neal Futran (Other Oncology), and Brittany Barber (Other Oncology).
 

UPCOMING EVENTS
» March 8, 2023, 12:00-1:00pm: Mini-Symposium Hosted by the UW Oral Health Sciences Graduate Program
The Oral Health Sciences Program will be hosting two-in person presentations focusing on cancer:

  • "The E-cadherin-ESR1-GRPR axis defines a sex-specific metastatic pathway in melanoma" by Lionel Larue, PhD, Deputy Director of Research, Institut Curie (France)
  • "An induced suppressor mutation in mouse MITF unravels the effects of the melanoma-predisposing E318K mutation in humans" by Eiríkur Steingrímsson, PhD, Professor, University of Iceland Biomedical Center (Iceland)
The symposium will be held in the Turner Auditorium (D209), Magnuson Health Sciences Center, University of Washington campus.
» March 20, 2023, 10:00-11:00am: Cancer Consortium Foundational Insights Seminar Series
Dr. Mica Estrada (Associate Professor, Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences and the Institute for Health and Aging at UCSF) will be giving a talk entitled “How Kindness Grows Inclusion and Equity in Academia” in the Pelton Auditorium on the Fred Hutch campus. A remote option will also be available for those unable to attend in-person.

For more information, click here. 

*This event is sponsored in part by CCSG funding*
» March 24 & April 6, 2023: Community-Based Participatory Research Virtual Workshop
The FHCC-NMSU U54 collaboration has developed a free virtual Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) Workshop on March 24th and April 6th. This workshop is led and facilitated by leaders in this field.
 
This introductory workshop is open to all students, postdocs, staff and faculty interested in learning more about community-engaged research practices. One goal is to prepare participants for intermediate-level training. Scientists in all life science research fields (e.g., basic science, public health science, and clinical research) are welcome and encouraged to attend.
 
To register, click here. 
» April 5, 2023, 2:00-3:00pm: PAM Seminar featuring Daniel J. Slade
This seminar will feature Daniel Slade, PhD, an Associate Professor and Director of the Graduate Program in the Department of Biochemistry at Virginia Tech.

The seminar will be held in Pelton Auditorium on the Fred Hutch Campus, and will also be streamed via Zoom.
» May 1, 2023: Pathways to Equity Symposium 
Save the date for this annual symposium, which highlights collaborations between the communities in our catchment area, Consortium faculty, and the Office of Community Outreach & Engagement. More details coming soon!

*This event is sponsored in part by CCSG funding*
» May 9, 2023: Joint Retreat for the PAM IRC and Microbiome Research Initiative
The 2023 PAM IRC and Microbiome Research Initiative Joint Retreat will take place in the O’Mack Suites of the Steam Plant (Fred Hutch Campus). Please save the date on your calendars and look for more details to come soon. More information can be found on this CenterNet page. (Note that accessing CenterNet requires Fred Hutch credentials.)

*This event is sponsored in part by CCSG funding*
» May 12, 2023, 10:00am-3:00pm: Cancer Consortium Survivorship Program Research Symposium: Cardiometabolic Complications After Cancer
This symposium will feature a keynote presentation by Bonnie Ky, MD, MSCE, from the University of Pennsylvania. The event will be held in-person in the Behnke Suites, Arnold Building (Fred Hutch Campus).

For more information, including a link to RSVP, click here.

Questions? Please contact Emily Jo Artim.
*This event is sponsored in part by CCSG funding*
» May 19, 2023: Dr. Eli Estey Symposium
The UW Division of Hematology is pleased to present "AML pathologists and therapy: a scientific symposium in honor of Dr. Eli Estey" at Fred Hutch Cancer Center.

Featured Presenters:
  • Jorge Cortes, MD (Georgia Cancer Center)
  • John DiPersio, MD, PhD (Washington University School of Medicine)
  • Sergei Doulatov, PhD (University of Washington)
  • Benjamin Ebert, MD, PhD (Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard University)
  • Christopher Hourigan, DM, DPhil. (NHLBI, National Institutes of Health)
  • Mary-Beth Percival, MD (University of Washington & Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center)
  • David Scadden, MD (Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard University)
  • Charles Schiffer, MD (Wayne State University)
For questions or more information, please email Mona Deprey or click here. Attendees can register using this link. 

*This event is sponsored in part by CCSG funding*
» [Ongoing] Translational Data Science (TDS) Integrated Research Center (IRC) Seminar Series
Upcoming Speakers:

  • April 6, 11:00am: Juan Lavista Ferres, PhD (Chief Scientist and Lab director of the Microsoft AI for Good Research Lab) [Zoom link here; Meeting ID 818 6045 6968; Passcode 135392]
  • May 4, 11:00am: Stephanie Hicks, PhD (Associate Professor, Department of Biostatistics, John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health) [Zoom link here; Meeting ID 832 5814 4605; Passcode 595947]
  • June 1, 11:00am: Peter Kharchenko, PhD (Gilbert S. Omenn Associate Professor of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School) [Zoom link here; Meeting ID 820 3600 9753; Passcode 417176]
» [Ongoing] Pathogen Associated Malignancies (PAM) IRC
Upcoming Speakers:

  • May 17, 2:00pm: Qian Yin, PhD (Assistant Professor, Florida State University)
Additional details TBD.
 

FROM THE OFFICE OF COMMUNITY OUTREACH & ENGAGEMENT
Now Accepting Nominations for the 2023 Beti Thompson Awards!
The Office of Community Outreach & Engagement gives out two awards each year named for Dr. Beti Thompson, a community-based participatory research practitioner, who devoted her research career to helping underserved populations by working with community partners and stakeholders to develop culturally relevant interventions that have addressed public health concerns brought forth by the community. 
Do you know an individual, group or organization who has/have made an extraordinary impact on the health and well-being of their community?  Nominate them for the Community Champion Award to recognize them for their dedication and service to their community. 

Do you know an outstanding faculty member from the Cancer Consortium who has made significant contributions to cancer health equity research and the scientific understanding of the etiology, detection, diagnosis, treatment or prevention of cancer disproportionately affecting underrepresented or marginalized communities?  Nominate them for the Cancer Health Equity Research Award.

Nominations are due by Monday, March 27, 2023. Nomination information and links to submit nominations can be found here.  Awards will be presented at the Pathways to Equity Symposium on Monday, May 1, 2023.
New Episodes of the OCOE Podcast Are Available!
The OCOE podcast, “Cancer Health Equity NOW,” released a new episode in February!  Listen in as members of the OCOE catch up with Jeff Ketchel, Executive Director of the Washington State Public Health Association, to talk about rural health policy. Click here to listen.  
 

FROM THE OFFICE OF FACULTY AFFAIRS & DIVERSITY

Applications for the 5th Annual Dr. Eddie Méndez Scholar Award Are Open

Fred Hutch is seeking applications for the 5th Annual Dr. Eddie Méndez Scholar Award, which recognizes outstanding postdoctoral fellows from any discipline conducting research on cancer, infectious diseases, or basic science. The award was created to recognize Dr. Méndez’s commitment to cancer research and supporting early-career scientists from historically excluded backgrounds. This award aims to build a community between postdoctoral scholars aiming to pursue academic faculty careers and scientists at Fred Hutch.

This award recognizes the achievements of post-doctoral fellows from across the U.S. from backgrounds that are underrepresented in science based on the NIH definition, which includes individuals from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups (Blacks or African Americans, Hispanics or Latinos, American Indians or Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders), individuals with disabilities, and individuals from disadvantaged backgrounds. We acknowledge that not all groups historically excluded from science are within the NIH definition and have expanded eligibility to also include scientists who are LGBTQ+, formerly incarcerated, and more. A selection committee consisting of Fred Hutch faculty will select up to ten awardees. Fred Hutch will provide an honorarium to awardees, and Fred Hutch will cover all expenses related to travel and accommodations.

Awardees will present at a scientific symposium honoring Dr. Eddie Méndez and have the opportunity to meet with Fred Hutch faculty and senior leaders. We plan to hold this event in person on the Fred Hutch campus in Seattle, WA on October 23-24th 2023.

The aims of this award are to:

  1. Network with peer/near peers (the cohort) and Fred Hutch staff & faculty
  2. Share your science and have achievements recognized by the FH community
  3. Provide awardees with info about FH as a prospective faculty and/or open the door for future collaborations

Applications are due April 1, 2023. For more info and to apply, click here.
 

FROM THE OFFICE OF EDUCATION & TRAINING

Trainee Travel Award Scholarship Is Available

The Fred Hutch/University of Washington/Seattle Children’s Cancer Consortium Trainee Travel Award Scholarship is available for postdoctoral fellows and graduate students who wish to further their professional development at a conference. Faculty advisors must be a member of the Cancer Consortium. Consortium members can be found here.

The scholarship is for up to $1,500 or the cost of the conference, whichever is less. Applications will be accepted until Friday, March 31, 2023. To find more information or submit an application, click here.

For any questions, please reach out to KC Cruz.
 

FROM THE OFFICE OF FACULTY AFFAIRS & DIVERSITYCONSORTIUM LEADER CLOSEUP: DR. McGARRY HOUGHTON
Dr. McGarry Houghton is a pulmonologist, co-leader of the Fred Hutch Lung Cancer SPORE, and program leader of the Consortium's developing Lung Cancer research program. For this month's leadership spotlight, I met with Dr. Houghton to talk about exciting things happening in his lab and what's occupying his thoughts lately.
What’s something exciting that you’re working on (either Consortium-related or not)?
In my own lab, what I’m most excited about is trying to figure out how neutrophils are blocking effective immune responses to cancer. This is something I’ve been studying for 20 years, and I feel like we’re finally starting to really understand it. There are a number of projects in my lab that are mechanistic-based, looking at exactly how neutrophils make anti-tumor lymphocytes’ lives difficult, and some of those things have therapeutic relevance. But the thing I’m most excited about is actually that we started a clinical trial two weeks ago that will antagonize neutrophils in lung cancer patients in conjunction with immune checkpoint inhibitors. It’s the first time in my career that work from my own lab has made it into the clinic. I’m a physician, I’m not an oncologist – I’m a pulmonologist. So I’ve always thought of science in clinically relevant terms. But I started out, like a lot of people, at a mouse level, trying to ask and answer questions in mouse models. I never really thought my work would make it into clinical trials, so I’m really excited to see how that work comes out.

How did you become a scientist? Is that what you’d always wanted to be?
What I’m doing is an accident, I guess. I wanted to go to medical school when I was younger, at a relatively young age. So getting to medical school wasn’t surprising, but when I was an internal medicine resident, I liked the ICU because the people were really sick and it was a whole new level of medicine that I hadn’t seen before. And I thought that stuff was really cool. Now, I don’t like the ICU at all. It’s just turning the oxygen up and turning it down and turning the drips up and turning them down, and I don’t find it very stimulating, I suppose. But I went into pulmonary and critical care because of the critical care, and then wound up working in a lung biology lab and really fell in love with that, which was not my intention. I started out studying cigarette smoke-induced emphysema because that’s what my mentor did, and realized all the stuff I was studying in emphysema, those immune cells and inflammatory cells were in lung cancer also, and no one was really studying those cells and what they were doing. So when I started my own program, that’s what I built it on.

What's something exciting that you’re doing outside of work?
Well, my brain is occupied by four things: neutrophils, my bicycle, wine, and a football club in London called Crystal Palace. My wife is from England, so I’m addicted to the Premier League. But I try to balance out my work life with cycling. Last year, I trained all year for one race in Oregon, and I rode about 8,000 miles over the year. This year, the SPORE renewal is due and the CCSG renewal is due, and I’m riding about once a week. So yeah, 180 miles a week last year, and about 30 a week this year. It has to ebb and flow based on your priorities. I was really grateful to have the opportunity to ride heavy last year and do that race, but this year I’m focused on my work.

What’s the coolest concert you’ve ever been to?
I’m into jazz, and so I’ve seen some big rock acts from when I grew up, but I’d say that the coolest concert I ever saw was a guy named Pat Metheny, who’s a jazz musician, at the Wolf Trap. The Wolf Trap is outside of Washington DC as you drive out to Dulles Airport in Virginia. Imagine a beautiful forest in Virginia that they just cut a hole in the middle of and built an outside amphitheater. So you park your car in a parking lot and you walk through a hiking trail, and then you pop out into this amphitheater, and it’s the most wonderful place to see a show. They play all kinds of concerts there, but I saw my favorite jazz musician play there one summer evening and was with my best friend. It was fantastic.

What's the biggest leadership lesson you’ve learned over the course of your career?
I think it’s easier to be the leader of a team you’re part of, where you’re all moving together, than when you’re out ahead of a group and trying to tell them to come to where you are. I’m the reluctant leader – I’ll use the SPORE as an example of this. You know, I was the most logical person to do it, these are my colleagues and I was happy to lead it and to do the work and to get us all organized and tweak people or push ‘em and pull ‘em into the right direction. It’s much easier than saying, “Hey, I’m going to build this program and you’re going to do what I want you to.” You want to be the benevolent dictator, you want to have veto power, but you don’t really want to tell people what to do. You want people to organically move in the right direction. And I think if you build the team in the right way and give people all the knowledge and the belief that we’re going to try collectively to move something forward, it’s better than just telling them what you want them to do. It’s much easier to know that people are willing to work with you rather than coming in with new ideas that people are reluctant to change. So it’s been much easier for me in that sense, to be the person in a group who led it rather than coming in from the outside.

What’s your favorite type of wine?
I had an uncle who had a farm house in southern Tuscany near a town called Montalcino, which is famous – well, famous in Italy, not as famous here in the States – famous for a type of wine called Brunello di Montalcino. That’s where I vacation for the most part, is in this town, so I love the wine, but it’s also the nostalgia. It’s a beautiful part of the world. I like lots of different types of wine. I’m partial to the Italians and also the French. I don’t drink American wine much because I think it tastes like – well, something I can’t put in print. I’m not a big fan of North American wines. But I really love the Italian wines.

What’s a fun fact that people probably wouldn’t know about you?
I smoked a cigarette at age five. My brother and sister were 10 and 12 years older than me, and they would go do things, and I thought as a kid if they let me in on it, that I would get in just as much trouble as them if I told Mom and Dad. Here I am, I’ve spent my whole professional life trying to help people with their diseases from smoking cigarettes – I never was a cigarette smoker – and I just always found that ironic. 
 
FRED HUTCH/UNIVERISTY OF WASHINGTON/SEATTLE CHILDREN'S CANCER CONSORTIUM
1100 FAIRVIEW AVE. N., SEATTLE, WA 98109
https://www.cancerconsortium.org/

Award number P30 CA015704-48