Two Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center investigators have earned grant awards from The V Foundation for Cancer Research. Raymond Blind, PhD, assistant professor of Medicine, Biochemistry and Pharmacology, has received a two-year grant to examine how proteins induce cancerous tumors to grow. Justin Balko, PharmD, PhD, assistant professor of Medicine and Cancer Biology and leader of Molecular Oncology in the Center for Cancer Targeted Therapies, has been awarded a two-year grant to determine what makes some cancer therapies, especially new immunotherapies, more effective against the disease.
Centerstone, one of the nation's leading not-for-profit behavioral health care providers, has been awarded a three-year, $4.5 million grant to implement a U.S. Department of Labor Reentry Demonstration Project for Young Adults. The project goals include preventing and reducing crime in high-risk areas of Middle Tennessee and Southern Illinois by enhancing workforce reentry strategies for 563 people, ages 18 to 24, who have been involved with the juvenile or adult justice systems.
Ankush Gosain, MD, PhD, FACS, FAAP, associate professor in the University of Tennessee Health Science Center Department of Surgery, has been awarded a $785,220 grant from the NIDDK to continue research for the treatment of a birth defect that can affect the colon of newborns.
A Step Ahead Foundation of Middle Tennessee (ASAFMT) has received a $10,200 donation from 100+ Women Who Care of Middle Tennessee to support the organization's family planning efforts. ASAFMT is a new non-profit whose mission is to improve educational, economic, and health outcomes for women and their children in Middle Tennessee. The Foundation is currently working with the Neighborhood Health clinics to provide free long-acting reversible contraception (LARC), such as IUDs and contraceptive implants, to women with little or no insurance coverage.