Damon Runyon News

The Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation has named the first cohort of the Damon Runyon Scholars Program for Advancing Research and Knowledge (SPARK), a one-year intensive cancer research internship program for post-baccalaureate students who come from varied backgrounds. The goal of the program is to provide young trainees who have the potential to become leaders in cancer research with rigorous scientific training and a network of mentors and peers to support their next steps into graduate school and beyond.

Four scientists with exceptional promise and novel approaches to fighting cancer have been named the 2024 recipients of the Damon Runyon Physician-Scientist Training Award. This award, established to help bolster the ranks of this vital cohort of cancer researchers, provides physicians who have completed clinical specialty fellowship training with the opportunity to become leaders in translational and clinical research. The awardees are selected through a highly competitive and rigorous process by a committee of leading cancer researchers who are themselves physician-scientists.

The National Academy of Sciences (NAS), established in 1863, is the body of distinguished researchers “charged with providing independent, objective advice to the nation on matters related to science and technology.” Election to membership is among the highest honors a scientist can receive. This year, four former Damon Runyon Fellows and one current Board Member join the NAS ranks, bringing the total number of Damon Runyon alumni in NAS to 104.

A tissue biopsy, in which a section of skin is surgically removed for microscopic evaluation, has long been the most effective means of diagnosing skin cancer. But biopsies are invasive and time-consuming procedures, with patients often waiting days for results, developing scars, or forgoing biopsy altogether and opting to “wait and see.” Given that one in five Americans will develop skin cancer in their lifetime, this is a dilemma many of us have experienced firsthand.

Immunotherapies to treat pancreatic cancer—a disease with a nearly 90 percent mortality rate—have been the subject of intensive research efforts in recent years, largely because they have succeeded where other treatment approaches have failed. New developments in mRNA vaccines, immune-enhancing therapies, and combination immunotherapy-chemotherapy regimens have marked a new era in pancreatic cancer treatment. But still, for many patients, nothing seems to work.

The Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation’s Annual Breakfast was held on Wednesday, June 12, 2024, at the Metropolitan Club in New York City, and raised more than $1.5 million. Ken Langone, Chairman of Invemed Associates and Co-Founder of The Home Depot, was honored for his longstanding support of Damon Runyon and his shared commitment to investing in bold ideas with the potential to have transformational impact.

Damon Runyon has announced its 2024 Quantitative Biology Fellows, four exceptional early-career scientists who are bringing cutting-edge computational tools to bear on some of the most important questions in cancer biology. From the packaging of DNA to mechanisms of chemotherapy resistance, their projects aim to shed light on these fundamental questions through large-scale data collection, mathematical modeling, and quantitative analysis.

Just as the study of a growing plant or animal must take into account its environment, cancer researchers must look beyond a tumor to understand how the surrounding tissue impacts its development. In the case of gliomas, the most common and aggressive type of brain tumor, this means looking at neurons—what signals they emit, and how these signals may play a role in brain tumor progression.  

A recent study by former Damon Runyon-Sohn Fellow Kathryn R. Taylor, PhD, and her colleagues at Stanford University sheds new light on these questions.  

Renal cell carcinoma ranks among the top ten most common cancers globally, with the clear cell subtype (ccRCC) accounting for the majority of metastatic cases. While some ccRCC tumors respond to immunotherapy treatment, it is often difficult to predict which patients will benefit. But those who do likely have something else in common—which is why, as with many problems involving pattern recognition, researchers are turning to artificial intelligence (AI) to help them figure out what this “something” is.

Damon Runyon scientists and industry partners gathered on Thursday, March 7, for the 2024 Accelerating Cancer Cures Symposium, hosted by AbbVie on their campus in South San Francisco.