Cancer Biology and Signaling

University Of California, San Diego, La Jolla CA

Investigators

Linked publications & trials

Abstract

The purview of basic cancer research is to address the fundamental mechanisms of biological processes that underlie the initiation and the progression of cancer. Over the past 2 decades, studies of cancer biology have led to the establishment of a general framework for tumor development. In this framework, a series of 8 biological events required for the formation of cancer have been identified: (a) increased cell proliferation, (b) decreased cell death, (c) defects in terminal differentiation, (d) escape from life-span restriction, (e) genome instability, (f) immune evasion, (g) angiogenesis, and (h) invasion and metastasis. Members of the Cancer Biology and Signaling (CBS) Program conduct basic research on the biological processes that underlie the initiation and progression of cancer. The scientific goals of the CBS Program are to fill some of those gaps in knowledge, focusing on fundamental mechanisms in 2 general areas of biology: signal transduction and cell growth. The CBS program has 34 members from 8 academic departments with $14.3 Million of peer-reviewed research grant funding (annual direct costs), including $3.4 Million from NCI. Members of the CBS Program published 751 programmatically aligned articles (2007-2012); 10% were the result of intra-programmatic collaborations, 15% were inter-programmatic. Members participate in a monthly luncheon seminar series to exchange research results. The Cancer Center adds value to the research projects in CBS by providing shared facilities, consultation on state of the art technologies, human tissue samples, seed grants for translational research, and recruitment of outstanding investigators to Cancer Center Programs.