UNSW Medicine Cancer Research announces seed grants

UNSW Medicine Cancer Research has committed almost $250,000 in new seed grants for five interdisciplinary projects led by early- and mid-career researchers to be undertaken in 2020. 

Congratulations to the five successful E/MCRs and their teams.

• Dr Chantal Kopecky (UNSW Sydney): Innovative nanomedicines to improve drug delivery and metabolic reprogramming in pancreatic cancer.
  Organisations involved: Children's Cancer Institute, Garvan Institute, Kinghorn Cancer Centre, St Vincent's Hospital Sydney, SESLHD, UNSW Sydney, Western Sydney University
• Dr Omid Faridani (UNSW Sydney and Garvan Institute): Single-cell multi-omics of circulating tumour cells as a predictive biomarker in pancreatic cancer
  Organisations involved: Garvan Institute, Kinghorn Cancer Centre, St Vincent's Hospital Sydney, SESLHD, Swinburne University of Technology, UNSW Sydney
• Dr Orazio Vittorio (UNSW Sydney and Children’s Cancer Institute): Harnessing copper in glioblastoma to enhance anti-tumour immune response
  Organisations involved: Children's Cancer Institute, Ingham Institute, SESLHD, UNSW Sydney
• Dr Ursula Sansom-Daly (SESLHD and UNSW Sydney): Partnering with community organisations to deliver online resilience programs for young people and parents after cancer treatment
  Organisations involved: Children's Cancer Institute, CONCERT, Ingham Institute, SESLHD, Sydney Children's Hospitals Network, SWSLHD, UNSW Sydney, Western Sydney University
• Dr Vikneswary Batumalai (SWSLHD, Ingham Institute and UNSW Sydney): Reducing unwarranted variation in Oncology: Urgent action needed
  Organisations involved: Genesis Care, Ingham Institute, St Vincent's Hospital Sydney, SESLHD, SWSLHD, Sydney Catalyst, UNSW Sydney

The E/MCR seed grants fund academics and clinical academics up to 15 years post-PhD to lead new collaborative research with mentoring and support provided through a structured team. They aim to develop our research workforce and emerging leaders.

The successful projects are substantive, cross-disciplinary initiatives with evidence of a clear pathway to significant external peer reviewed funding of any category to sustain and build ongoing research.  The funds for these collaborative grants are sourced from a generous philanthropic donation and UNSW Cancer Research funds administered by UNSW Sydney.

Find out more about UNSW Medicine’s Cancer Clinical Academic Group and get involved with the research partnership. Or visit the Cancer Research Fund at UNSW Philanthropy to find out more about contributing financially to our cancer researchers.