 |
|
|
NCI Director's Gold Star Awards |
|
|
At a Feb. 15 NCI All-Hands meeting, director Andrew C. von Eschenbach presented the NCI Director's Gold Star Award in recognition of special accomplishments. Award recipients were Drs. Michelle Christian, Cancer Therapy Evaluation Program; Gregory J. Downing, Office of Technology and Industrial Relations; Daniel Gallahan, Division of Cancer Biology; Jon F. Kerner, Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences; and Sanya Springfield, Comprehensive Minority Biomedical Branch.
|
|
NCI Releases Software for Sharing Microarray Data
NCI recently released a new software tool, caArray, that will help medical researchers share and analyze microarray data. This technology can be used by cancer researchers to identify new genes associated with certain cancers, classify tumors, and predict patient outcomes. Researchers in fields other than cancer are expected to find equally valuable applications for caArray.
The tool's open-source, open-access software was developed by NCI's Center for Bioinformatics (NCICB) and can be used to create public repositories of microarray data, linking scientists across the country and around the world. Built on international standards of MAGE and MIAME, caArray promotes the sharing of high-quality, well-annotated microarray data within the research community while ensuring secure sharing of sensitive data. The software is compatible with the cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid (caBIG), so data can be integrated for further analysis.
Researchers can download the software at http://ncicb.nci.nih.gov/download. For more information, contact Mervi Heiskanen at heiskame@mail.nih.gov or Sue Dubman at dubmans@mail.nih.gov.
NCI Workshop Identifies Strategies and Priorities for Biomarker Discovery
NCI has recently funded two consortia that will create public informatics and data resources to help evaluate profiles of serum and tissue proteins associated with mouse models of human cancer. These resources will integrate with NCICB's caBIG and ultimately extend beyond mouse models to support cooperative clinical cancer biomarker discovery efforts. Last week, consortia representatives met in Seattle with proteomics informatics experts, potential resource users, and NCICB staff to prioritize development needs and outline a plan to accomplish consortia goals. Representatives discussed consortia designs and the current state of supporting informatics, data, and specimen annotation resources. Workshop attendees identified priorities and strategies to optimize resource use and discussed the issues and needs for extending the informatics resources to meet emerging needs in clinical cancer biomarker research. More information about the mouse model consortia and NCI clinical proteomic technologies initiatives will be available online this spring.
Langer to Present at NCI Nanotechnology Seminar Series
Dr. Robert S. Langer, Kenneth J. Germeshausen Professor of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is the next featured speaker in NCI's Nanotechnology Seminar Series. The series features innovative perspectives on current research and development efforts in nanotechnology applied to cancer diagnosis, treatment, and prevention. Dr. Langer's lecture, "Novel Drug Delivery Systems for Cancer," will take place February 24 from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. at the NIH campus in Bethesda, Md., in the Clinical Center's Lipsett Amphitheater.
This presentation will be webcast at http://videocast.nih.gov. Sign language interpreters will be provided. For more information on the lecture, visit http://nano.cancer.gov/events_nanotech_seminar_series.asp.
|
