UAB’s Division of Neurosurgery, Cancer Center Receive $2.3 Million to Research Brain-tumor Therapies

The National Cancer Institute has awarded a $2.3 million Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) grant to University of Alabama-Birmingham’s Comprehensive Cancer Center and the UAB Division of Neurosurgery, to be used over a three-year period, to conduct research and develop new therapies to treat brain tumors.

G. Yancey Gillespie, PhD, professor of surgery; and James M. Markert Jr., MD, MPH, FAANS, James G. Galbraith professor of neurosurgery and division director, both from the UAB Division of Neurosurgery and senior scientists in the neuro-oncology program in the UAB Comprehensive Cancer Center, will co-lead the program to study contemporary therapeutics for anaplastic gliomas, the most deadly and most frequent form of malignant brain tumors. UAB is one of only four institutions awarded a brain-tumor SPORE grant. The award also includes $200,000 from the National Institutes of Neurological Disorders and Stroke to accelerate the initiation of two new clinical trials in the first year. To read more about the grant and the research planned, click here.