Congratulations to Hui Zong and his team! Hui Zong, PhD, an associate professor in our department and P. Todd Stukenberg, PhD, a professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics have been selected as one of The Pew Charitable Trusts’ 2022 class of Innovation Fund investigators. The Stukenberg and Zong team is one of only six pairs of researchers whose projects were funded. Stukenberg and Zong are studying a new mouse model to engineer a better way to study human cancer development. The Pew Trusts support collaboration among diverse communities of biomedical scientists to advance scientific discovery and improve human health. [more]
The pair plan to engineer a new tumor model in mice that incorporates mutations along with aneuploidy. That should more accurately represent human cancer evolution and the interplay with immune responses. Findings from this model could bring a deeper understanding of tumor biology and lead to better predictive models for testing how well drugs work against the disease. [more]