Spring 2000 Newsletter: Connections with Friends

DNA. RNA. Genetic manipulation. Translational research. Gene splicing. Stem cells. Apoptosis. Signal transduction. Tumorigenesis. T cells. Oncogenes.

Cancer scientists come to the Cancer Research Foundation and ask us to fund their research projects, enterprises whose descriptions contain those words, along with other unfamiliar words. So, how do we find out just what they plan to do, what these molecular biologists and biochemists and geneticists and cell biologists are going to do in their laboratories?

We know that science is vital to sustain life, and that it is an ongoing process of discovery to unravel the secrets. We all want to help cure cancer. We are predisposed to want to support the Chicago academic scientists who ask for our help. And yet their science and project descriptions are complex.

"Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone." Albert Einstein said that. We ask that scientists who apply for funding to the Cancer Research Foundation prepare scientific documents for the rank and review process by other scientists, and an additional interpretation, paraphrased in lay language, for our trustees. In discussion at funding meetings, we are fortunate to have medical consultants who can further clarify these difficult scientific concepts.

It has been said by scientists that the mammoth-size Human Genome Project will change the world when it is completed this year. The goal is to uncover the exact chemical sequencing, molecule by molecule, that constitutes the entire human "genome" or the entire set of human DNA. Scientists will find out why some people get sick from certain illnesses while others do not. Then they can develop tests and treatments and cures.

One of the most significant aspects of the basic research that we fund is that advances in the understanding of fundamental processes usually lead to many types of practical applications. The research we fund in the laboratory will yield new tools and concepts that will provide the knowledge for scientists to develop a sophisticated plan to fix a "broken" genetic code - for any cancer.

And so, there is some urgency in funding the most promising research. One of our goals is to fund "bench to bedside" cancer research: translational research. The University of Chicago receives most of our major research support: their physicians and scientists are often the people who invent new approaches in the laboratories to change medicine for the better at the bedside.

In this issue of Connections, you will read about our support for five young investigators and one senior scientist. It is our hope that we are clearly communicating to you what important and exciting research your donor dollars are funding.

Merle Goldblatt Cohen
President