MRA Acral Melanoma Special Opportunity Awards
Acral melanoma is a rare and difficult-to-treat form of melanoma that arises on the palm, sole or beneath the nail. Acral melanoma accounts for approximately 2-3% of all melanomas and its incidence is relatively constant across individuals of all races and skin colors. Compared to cutaneous melanoma, acral melanoma is more likely to be diagnosed at a later stage and has a survival rate that is 10-20% lower, overall. In fall of 2017, MRA released a Special Opportunity Request for Proposals inviting applications for both Team Science (up to $900,000 over 3-years) and Individual Investigator Awards (up to $225,000 over 3-years) that could lead to therapeutic targeting of acral melanoma with priority given to proposals that of focus on NF1 loss, TERT promoter alterations, CCND1, and/or CRKL amplification. As a result, the following awards were issued in 2018:
Telomere crisis in acral melanoma: Diagnostic and prognostic potentials: Takes a look at acral melanomas on the chromosome level to determine whether a process known as telomere crisis, which causes extensive damage to a cell’s genome, contributes to acral melanoma development and progression.
The Black Family-MRA Team Science Award
- Titia de Lange, Ph.D., The Rockefeller University
- Marcin Imielinski, M.D., Ph.D., Joan Sanford I. Weill Medical College of Cornell
- John Maciejowski, Ph.D., Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center: Young Investigator
Defining and targeting driver events in acral melanoma: Seeks to address some of the major barriers to new therapies for acral melanoma by developing a novel mouse model, as well as studying the genetic processes linked to tumor development.
U.S. Trust-MRA Team Science Award
Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute
- Keiran Smalley, Ph.D.
- Yian Chen, Ph.D.
- John Koomen, Ph.D.
- Jane Messina, M.D.
- Jamie Teer, Ph.D.
- Florian Karreth, Ph.D.
Patient-focused therapy for acral melanoma: Aims to take a precision medicine approach to better suppress acral melanoma growth and spread by matching drugs to the specific genetic and/or genomic changes present in a patient’s tumor.
The Sokoloff Family-MRA Team Science Award, with collaborative funding from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Yale University
- Ruth Halaban, Ph.D.
- Alfred Bothwell, Ph.D.
- Jian Cao, Ph.D.
- Qin Yan, Ph.D.
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
- Charlotte Ariyan, M.D., Ph.D.
- Neal Rosen, M.D., Ph.D.
- Richard White, M.D., Ph.D.
- Jedd Wolchok, M.D., Ph.D.
- Gauri Panse, M.D., Young Investigator
Regulating telomerase and telomere homeostasis in acral melanoma development: Plans to create new models to better study the telomerase gene (TERT), a main cause of mutations and other genomic alterations in cancer cells, including acral melanoma, to find approaches to treat cells with TERT abnormalities.
MRA Team Science Award, collaboratively funded by the research institutions
The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine
- Gavin P. Robertson, Ph.D.
- Raghavendra Gowda, Ph.D., Young Investigator
Washington State University
- Jiyue Zhu, Ph.D.
- De Cheng, Ph.D.
- Shobhan Gaddameedhi, Ph.D., Young Investigator
Regulating telomerase and telomere homeostasis in acral melanoma development: Will combine clinical, histological, immune, and molecular analyses of acral melanoma patients from different ethnicities to better classify risks among each group.
MRA Young Investigator Award, collaboratively funded by University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center
- Phyu Aung, M.D., Ph.D.,
A novel approach for NF1 mutant melanoma subclassification: Will combine clinical, histological, immune, and molecular analyses of acral melanoma patients from different ethnicities to better classify risks among each group.
MRA Young Investigator Award, collaboratively funded by University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center
- Edward Cooper Stites, M.D., Ph.D., The Salk Institute for Biological Studies