Who We Fund

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

Coming soon.

Program Name(s)

Student Mentorship and Research Training (SMART)

Project Title

Therapeutic potential of mitochondrial transplantation in the treatment of MDS

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Nitin Jain, MD, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Leukemia at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. He earned his medical degree from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi. He completed Internal Medicine residency at the Medical College of Wisconsin and fellowship in Hematology/Oncology at the University of Chicago. Dr. Jain research interests include new drug development for patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). Dr. Jain is Principal Investigator of several investigator-initiated phase I-II clinical trials, including combination targeted therapies (ibrutinib and venetoclax) in CLL, checkpoint inhibitors in Richter transformation, novel CD22 antibody drug conjugate in B-ALL, venetoclax + chemotherapy in B- and T-ALL, and off-the-self allogeneic CAR-T in B-ALL. The trial combining ibrutinib and venetoclax was published in New England Journal of Medicine in 2019. He has won many awards including ASCO merit award, Sabin Family Foundation Award in 2018 and MD Anderson Faculty Scholar award in 2020.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Translational Research Program

Project Title

Combination Targeted Therapy in Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia

LCK-targeted Therapy in T cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia

Emory University

Lawrence Boise, PhD is the R. Randall Rollins Chair of Oncology and Professor in the Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology in the Emory University School of Medicine. Dr. Boise also serves as the Associate Director of Education and Training in the Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University. He received his PhD from VCU-Medicine and did his postdoctoral training at the University of Michigan and the University of Chicago. Dr. Boise took his first faculty position at the University of Miami in 1996 and rose to the rank of Professor before moving to Emory in 2009. Dr. Boise was involved in early studies to identify genes that control cell survival and cell death and has been studying these processes to better understand how to improve our treatment of cancer, particularly the plasma cell malignancy multiple myeloma. Dr. Boise serves as a Senior Editor at Molecular Cancer Research and is on the editorial board of Blood Cancer Discovery.

Program Name(s)

Discovery

Project Title

Functional dissection of heterogeneity of responses to CAR T cells using Spatiotemporal Image-guided Genomic and Cellular Analysis (SaGA) in myeloma

TAP Partner

Enterome is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing breakthrough immunomodulatory drugs for the treatment of cancer and immune diseases. Enterome’s pioneering approach to drug discovery is based on its unique and powerful bacterial Mimicry drug discovery platform, allowing it to analyze and uncover new biological insights from the millions of gut bacterial proteins in constant cross-talk with the human body. Its first-in-class small protein and peptide drug candidates modulate the immune system by closely mimicking the structure, effect or actions of specific antigens, hormones, or cytokines. 

Program Name(s)

Therapy Acceleration Program

Project Title

A phase 2 trial of EO2463, a novel microbial-derived peptide therapeutic vaccine, as monotherapy, and in combination with lenalidomide and rituximab, for treatment of patients with indolent NHL

Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Dr. Hantel is a faculty member in the Divisions of Population Sciences and Leukemia at DFCI and an Instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His research focuses on characterizing and remediating clinical trial enrollment disparities for patients with blood cancers, for which he has been awarded career development awards from the NCI (K08) and ASCO to develop and test related multilevel interventions. He also leads multicenter care delivery trials assessing social determinants of health and the impact of Duffy null phenotype on trial participation and outcomes. Work related to these projects has led to multiple publications in journals such as in JAMA, JCO, JNCI, and NEJM. He co-chairs the working group of the DFCI Clinical Trial Access Committee and serves as the Health Disparities and Leukemia Committee Liaison for the Alliance cooperative group. In his clinical role, he cares for patients with leukemia and related hematologic malignancies.

Program Name(s)

Equity in Access

Project Title

The Collaboration and Infrastructure Program for Diversifying Blood Cancer Clinical Trials

Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Robert J. Soiffer, MD, is Chief of the Division of Hematologic Malignancies and Chair of the Executive Committee for Clinical Programs at Dana Farber Cancer Institute as well as the Worthington and Margaret Collette Professor of Medicine in the Field of Hematologic Oncology at Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Soiffer served as President of the American Society for Transplant and Cellular Therapies and Chair of the Advisory Board for the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research. He is a member of the Executive Steering Committees for Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network. Dr. Soiffer is Immediate Past Chair of the Board of Directors for the National Marrow Donor Program.

Dr. Soiffer conducts research focused on modulation of immune reconstitution in the setting of allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HCT). His goal is to develop technologies to improve patient outcomes by optimizing graft versus leukemia (GVL) activity without inducing graft versus host disease (GVHD). Dr. Soiffer has co-authored more than 400 peer-reviewed manuscripts and numerous book chapters, review articles, editorials, and monographs.

Program Name(s)

Specialized Center of Research Program

Project Title

Understanding and Overcoming Mechanisms of Immune Evasion after Allogeneic Transplant

Washington University in St. Louis

Dr. Fehniger is a Professor of Medicine at WashU Medicine in St. Louis. As a physician-scientist he leads a research program focused on developing novel immunotherapies for patients with blood cancer. His group pioneered studies discovering memory-like natural killer (NK) cell immunobiology and activity against acute myeloid leukemia and other hematologic malignancies. His team developed the platform for production of GMP-grade memory-like NK cells for use in academic clinical trials and translated these findings into early phase clinical trials advancing memory-like NK cellular therapy for both adult and pediatric patients. Correlative immunology from these trials identified multiple mechanisms whereby memory-like programs enhance NK cell response to blood cancers. Current research focuses on engineering memory-like NK cells with synthetic proteins to enhance targeting and function, identifying immunosuppressive mechanisms within blood cancer microenvironments, and translating these new findings to the clinic. He has mentored over 30 graduate, medical, and post-doctoral trainees as well as junior faculty. Dr. Fehniger serves as Co-leader of the Siteman Cancer Center Hematopoietic Development and Malignancies Program, Laboratory Director of the Center for Gene and Cellular Immunotherapy, and Director of the Siteman Cancer Center Biologic Therapies Core Facility. 

Program Name(s)

Academic Clinical Trials Program (ACT)

Project Title

NK cell immunotherapy to reduce relapse after haploidentical transplant for high-risk pediatric AML

TAP Partner

Ryvu Therapeutics is a clinical-stage drug discovery and development company focusing on novel small molecule therapies that address emerging targets in oncology using a proprietary discovery engine platform.

Program Name(s)

Therapy Acceleration Program

Project Title

A phase 2 study of RVU120, a novel CDK8 inhibitor, in combination with venetoclax in patients with AML

The University of Texas at Austin

William Matsui is a Professor of Oncology, Director of the Hematologic Malignancy Program, Associate Chair of Research, and the Deputy Director of the LiveSTRONG Cancer Institutes at the Dell Medical School and the University of Texas at Austin. He also serves as the interim Vice Dean of Research for Dell Med. Dr. Matsui's research has focused on understanding the intersection between cancer, stem cell, and developmental biology. His laboratory first identified unique populations of cancer cells with stem cell properties in multiple myeloma and found that several pathways regulating normal stem cells, including those involved in embryonic development, are abnormally activated in cancer stem cells. Importantly, these basic research studies have simultaneously been translationally relevant and served as the basis for over a dozen novel clinical trials.

Program Name(s)

Translational Research Program

Project Title

Stem cell features and Notch signaling in p53 deleted multiple myeloma

Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center

Dr. Courtnee Clough is a postdoctoral fellow in the Starczynowski lab at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. She has always been fascinated by the genetic basis of disease – understanding the mechanisms by which genetic mutations can hijack cellular function to promote disease has guided the entirety of my scientific career. Prior to moving to Cincinnati, she received her PhD in Molecular & Cellular Biology from the University of Washington in 2022. Her thesis work focused on defining the disease mechanism(s) of mutant SF3B1 mediated mis-splicing in myelodysplastic neoplasms with ring sideroblasts under the mentorship of Dr. Sergei Doulatov. Her postdoctoral project focuses on the role of dysregulated protein homeostasis in myeloid diseases such as MDS and VEXAS syndrome.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Project Title

Dissecting E1 ubiquitin enzyme function and therapeutic vulnerabilities in hypomorphic UBA1 myeloid disease

University of California, San Francisco

Dr. Elliot Stieglitz is a physician-scientist at the University of California, San Francisco whose research focuses on children diagnosed with juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia (JMML). He recently chaired a study, ADVL1512, a phase II clinical trial that tested the safety of trametinib in children with relapsed JMML. This trial met its primary objective and closed to accrual at the end of 2022. Dr. Stieglitz’s main laboratory focus is on developing novel therapies for JMML including CAR-T cells. He has generated patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models of JMML that will serve as the pre-clinical model in which to test CAR-T cells on this grant. These PDXs were generated in collaboration with Dr. Eric Padron, a key opinion leader in CMML and a collaborator on this grant. Dr. Stieglitz has also collaborated extensively with Dr. Tasian, an international leader in CAR-T therapy who is a Co-PI on this grant. This multi-disciplinary team will work together to advance CLL-1 CAR-T cells and trametinib into the clinic for CMML and JMML patients.

Program Name(s)

CMML Initiative

Project Title

CLL-1 CAR-T cells and trametinib for the treatment of Ras-mutated CMML and JMML

Beckman Research Institute of the City of Hope

I am a genetic epidemiologist and Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the City of Hope National Medical Center. During my PhD, my research was focused on genetic variation and its role in human disease, and I received training in genetic epidemiology. Keen to pursue a career in childhood cancer research, I obtained a postdoctoral position at UCSF studying the etiology of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), the most common childhood cancer. I held a faculty position at the University of Southern California from 2018-2025 before joining City of Hope, where I lead epidemiology studies of ALL in high-risk populations, including Hispanic/Latinos and children with Down syndrome, and investigations into the early-life origins of childhood leukemia. My research has led to several novel discoveries, identifying new risk factors for ALL and shedding light on how Down syndrome increases leukemia risk. Understanding the causes of childhood ALL is my life’s work, with the hope that our discoveries will help to develop precision prevention strategies.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Project Title

Leveraging Susceptible Populations and Unique Resources in a Pathway to Prevention of Childhood Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia