Celebrating its 25th year as the global leader in driving cutting-edge research leading to treatments and cures for prostate cancer, the Prostate Cancer Foundation (PCF) today announced it has awarded an additional $8 million in research funding to eight new 2017 PCF Challenge Award teams, bringing its total investment in 2017 to $27.8 million. PCF is the single largest non-governmental organization dedicated solely to funding prostate cancer research.
This funding will support international, multi-institutional, cross-disciplinary teams of scientists conducting highly innovative research with the highest potential for accelerating new and improved treatments for advanced prostate cancer. Each award-winning team received $1 million and will join 14 previously announced 2017 Challenge Award recipients in the PCF research portfolio.
“Of the eight teams awarded, six are investigating novel precision drug discovery for advanced cancers and two are accelerating treatment science in precision diagnosis and imaging of prostate cancer,” said Jonathan W. Simons, MD, president and chief executive officer, PCF. “We are highly optimistic that the research performed by these teams will lead to significant advances in precision medicine treatment for prostate cancer and improve and extend the lives of men with advanced disease.”
The winning teams were selected from a pool of 92 international applications following a rigorous peer review process that assessed each project’s scientific merit and potential impact to patients. The PCF Challenge Awards are highly coveted. As part of PCF’s commitment to accelerating innovation and supporting the career development of young investigators, teams are required to include at least three investigators, one of whom must be within six years of completing a research or medical training program.