Career Enhancement Program

The Program

The goal of the Career Enhancement Program of the Yale SPORE in Lung Cancer is to educate the next generation of investigators committed to translational research in lung cancer. The Career Enhancement Program will provide support of up to $50,000 to promising junior investigators and/or establish investigators who have not previously conducted lung cancer focused research. Proposed pilot projects should be innovative and be focused on a broad spectrum of research, and/or technology development applicable to human lung cancer risk, prevention, diagnosis, prognosis, or treatment.

Award Amounts: Up to $50,000 for one year.

Purpose: To provide support to foster the development of the next generation of lung cancer translational researchers. The aims of the Career Enhancement Program are to support promising early career stage lung cancer investigators and to enhance the careers of established investigators who have newly defined interests in pursing translational research in lung cancer. The purpose is also to generate preliminary data or evidence of collaboration for new NCI grant applications.

Eligibility: Open to investigators at an academic institution who can be described by one of the following categories:

Junior faculty holding appointments
Candidates for junior faculty appointments, (e.g., advanced postdoctoral fellows)
Established investigators, who are committed to re-focusing a substantial component of her/his research on thoracic oncology and the study of risk prevention, diagnosis, prognosis or treatment of human thoracic malignancies

Women and minority investigators are strongly encouraged to apply.

Requirements: If a grant is awarded, the P.I. and mentors must agree to abide by the attached Grant Guidelines (page 4) and to participate in the DRP/CEP Symposium to be held at Yale in May 2025 (tentative date).

Deadlines:

Letter of Intent: April 19, 2024
Full application: June 21, 2024

Letters of Intent and applications should be submitted at https://yale.infoready4.com

Download applications here

Previous Career Enhancement Awardees

2024 Career Enhancement Awardees: Maurizio Chioccioli: Alveolar intermediate progenitor cells as the cellular origin of lung adenocarcinoma (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Mandar Muzumdar )

Michael Chiorazzi: Testing novel interventions for HIV-associated NSCLC (Mentors: Kurt Schalper, Brinda Emu, Richard Flavell )

So Yeon Kim: Uncovering the biological drivers of CNS metastasis in KRAS-mutant NSCLC (Mentors: Kurt Schalper, Sarah Goldberg, Don Nguyen )

Mark Lee: The development of T cell receptor therapeutics targeting public NSCLC antigens (Mentor: Kurt Schalper )
2023 Career Enhancement Awardees: Ji Yeon Kim: Uncovering Oncogenotype-specific Vulnerabilities in Lung cancer (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Nikhil Joshi)

Mark Lee: Illuminating the “dark space” of T cell epitopes in non-small cell lung cancer (Mentors: Kurt Schalper)

Arnaud Augert: Understanding and targeting PBRM1 mutant small cell lung cancers (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Anne Chiang)

Bluma Lesch Heritable epigenetic sensitization to KRAS-induced lung cancer (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Andrew Xiao)
2022 Career Enhancement Awardees: Arnaud Augert: Understanding and targeting PBRM1 mutant small cell lung cancers (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Anne Chiang)

Thomas Hayman: PLK4 Inhibition as a Strategy to Enhance the Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Radiation Response (Mentors: Joseph Contessa, Megan King)

Bluma Lesch: Heritable epigenetic sensitization to KRAS-induced lung cancer (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Andrew Xiao)

Gavitt Woodard: Subtypes of CD8+ T-cells in lymph nodes and blood outside the primary tumor in NSCLC patients (Mentor: Lieping Chen)
2021 Career Enhancement Awardees: Luisa Escobar-Hoyos: RNA splicing as a novel therapeutic target in lung cancers with mutant p53 (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Sarah Goldberg)

Thomas Hayman: PLK4 Inhibition as a Strategy to Enhance the Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Radiation Response (Mentors: Joseph Contessa, Megan King)

Yansheng Liu: Phosphoproteomic analysis of TKI drug response and resistance in lung cancer (Mentors: Don Nguyen, Katerina Politi)

Rachel Perry: Precision Medicine Immunometabolic Approaches to Lung Cancer (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Nikhil Joshi)
2020 Career Enhancement Program Awardee: Sanjay Aneja: Deriving Imaging Based Biomarkers for Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer using Deep Learning (Mentors: Harlan Krumholz, Roy Herbst)

Luisa Escobar-Hoyos: RNA splicing as a novel therapeutic target in lung cancers with mutant p53 (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Sarah Goldberg)

Rachel Perry: Defining the Mechanism by which Obesity May Protect Against Lung Cancer (Mentors: Katerina Politi, Nikhil Joshi)
2019 Career Enhancement Awardees: Expansion and Activation of TIL from NSCLC (Michael Hurwitz Mentors: Scott Gettinger, Diane Krause)

Gene-environment interactions in lung adenocarcinoma development (Mandar Muzumdar Mentors: Charles Dela Cruz, Katerina Politi)

Overcoming resistance to immune checkpoint inhibition by co-targeting the innate and adaptive immune systems in NSCLC (Sarah Weiss Mentor: Scott Gettinger)
2018 Career Enhancement Awardees: Implementing a physical activity program in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (Brett Bade, PhD, Mentors: Melinda Irwin, Gerard Silvestri)

Role of Ripk3 inhibition in MDSCs in non-small cell lung cancer (Asha Jayakumar, PhD, Mentors: Alfred Bothwell, Nikhil Joshi)

Molecular determinants of lung adenocarcinoma progression (Mandar Muzumdar, MD, Mentors: Katerina Politi, Don Nguyen)
2017 Career Enhancement Awardees: Making first strides towards elucidating the importance of long noncoding RNAs in lung cancer (Nadya Dimitrova, Mentor: Katerina Politi)

The role of the pentose phosphate pathway in resistance to lung cancer therapy (Joelle Hillion, Mentor: Richard Kibbey)

Investigating mechanisms of anti-tumor T cell function in autochithonous models of lung adenocarcinoma (Nikhil Joshi, Mentor: Lieping Chen)

TCR sequences pre and post IO therapy (Yu Zhang, Mentor: Lieping Chen)
2016 Career Enhancement Awardees: Uncovering the functional roles of microRNAs in lung cancer metastasis (Sidi Chen, Mentors: Andre Levchenko, Roy Herbst)

End-of-Life Care in the Veteran’s Health Administration vs. Fee-for-Service Medicare among Patients with Advanced Lung Cancer (Carolyn Presley, Mentors: Cary Gross, Michal Rose)

Overcome resistance to EGFR inhibitors with microRNA-based therapy in lung cancer (Wencai Zhang, Mentors: Frank Slack, Daniel Costa)

“Immune shifting” as a potential mechanism of acquired resistance during anti-Programed Death (PD) therapy (Yu Zhang, Mentor: Lieping Chen)
2015 Career Enhancement Awardees: High-throughput screening for K-ras mutant tumor cell radiosensitizers (Ranjit Bindra, Mentors: Peter Glazer, Roy Decker)

Analysis of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes using quantitative methods in lung cancer: biological role and predictive value (Kurt Schalper, Mentors: David Rimm, Roy Herbst)

Role of lung microbiota in lung cancer development (Piotr Bielecki, Mentors: Richard Flavell, Lieping Chen)

Identifying non-small cell lung cancer associated circRNAs for therapeutic intervention (Brian Adams, Mentors: Frank Slack, Pier Paolo Pandolfi)

Directors

Harriet Kluger, MD
Harvey and Kate Cushing Professor of Medicine (Oncology) and of Dermatology; Director, Yale SPORE in Skin Cancer, Yale Cancer Center; Vice Chair for Collaborative Research, Internal Medicine; Chief, Division of Skin and Kidney Cancer; Associate Cancer Center Director, Education, Training and Faculty Development; Deputy Section Chief, Medical Oncology
Research Interests
Medical Oncology
Melanoma
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Patricia LoRusso, DO
Amy and Joseph Perella Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology); Chief, Experimental Therapeutics; Associate Cancer Center Director, Experimental Therapeutics
Research Interests
Clinical Trial, Phase I
Regenerative Medicine
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