Newswise — The Center for Prostate Disease Research (CPDR), Department of Surgery, Uniformed Services University (USU) and the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) were granted an award of $198,000 by the Department of Defense, United States Army Medical Research and Materiel Command (USAMRMC) for training gifted students from the University of the District of Columbia (UCD) in prostate cancer research.
The program goal is to immerse young students from historically black colleges and universities in prostate cancer research within the framework of a structured summer training program. CPDR is credited for landmark discoveries in prostate cancer research such as, the increased prevalence of prostate cancer among African American men and the recent discovery of frequent Ets-related Gene (ERG) oncogene over expression at early stages of prostate cancer.
In 2008, four UDC students were selected on a rigorous competitive academic basis for the twelve-week program. Every student chosen to participate in the program demonstrated outstanding excellence in advanced prostate cancer research. On Aug. 20, 2008 the students presented highlights of their training and research at the CPDR Headquarters in Rockville, Md. In attendance were Rachel Petty, Ph.D., Dean of the College of Art and Sciences at UDC; COL David G. McLeod, MC, USA (Ret.), Director and Founder of CPDR and Professor of Surgery (USU); COL David Burris, MD, FACS, DMCC, Professor and Chair, Department of Surgery, USU; and the Principal Investigators of the program -Shiv Srivastava, Ph.D., Co-Director of CPDR and Professor of Surgery; and Deepak Kumar, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, UDC, and the Summer Program Coordinators Albert Dobi, Ph.D., Assistant Director and Taduru Sreenath, Ph.D., Senior Staff Scientist and the CPDR research faculty and staff.
The names of the presenters and the titles of their concluding presentations are:
Fiteh Yelekal:"Increased levels of SPARC in prostate cancer is associated with metastasis"
Emmanuel Woode:"Biological function of ERG in prostate cancer"
Chiedozie Joseph Ayika:"A role for the tumor suppressor Annexin7 in prostate cancer"
Francisco R. Saenz:"Defining NKX3.1 as a negative regulator of ERG"
The Uniformed Services University is located on the grounds of Bethesda's National Naval Medical Center and across from the National Institutes of Health. It is the nation's federal school of medicine and graduate school of nursing. The university educates health care professionals dedicated to career service in the Department of Defense and the U.S. Public Health Service. Students are active-duty uniformed officers in the Army, Navy, Air Force and Public Health Service who are being educated to deal with wartime casualties, national disasters, emerging infectious diseases, and other public health emergencies. Of the university's more than 4,200 physician alumni, the vast majority serve on active duty and are supporting operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, offering their leadership and expertise.
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