Six researchers at the Georgia Cancer Center received grants on June 13 from funds collected through the 2021 Paceline ride.
The six proposals selected for the grants ranged from research projects for breast cancer and leukemia as well as developing a mobile lab to engage local high school students.
Dr. Jorge Cortes, director of the Georgia Cancer Center, said there were 20 projects submitted for consideration.
“Doing cancer research is difficult. It’s expensive. The support is not abundant. So, these kinds of grants, this kind of support allows investigators to do initial experiments to develop new projects, to do many things. And this year, we opened many categories to allow us to work in some of the areas where we have very important priorities,” he said.
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Among those selected, one is receiving a Paceline grant for the second time.
Dr. Tianxiang Hu was selected in 2020 for his research developing immunotherapies to fight leukemia. This year’s grant continues his leukemia research.
“With the funding provided by Paceline, I am able to perform cutting-edge single cell sequencing analysis of the tumor immune microenvironment in leukemia and dissect probable cancer-immune cell interactions that mediate the immune evasion process,” he said. “Further ongoing function investigation of these critical interactions holds the promise for the development of novel immunotherapy for cure of leukemia and other cancers.”
Paceline began in Augusta in 2018 to bring people together with a common goal: To cure cancer faster. The first fundraising ride was in 2019, but the 2020 ride was virtual because of COVID-19. They were able to stage the bicycle ride in 2021.
“I think the community pulled together really, really well,” said Paceline President Martyn Jones. “And it wasn’t easy, and we managed to pull off to the best of our ability an awesome event to take part in. Last year, we had actually an uplift of 40% more participation, and in fact, 60% more fundraising dollars. So, it was actually pretty good by all standards, in the end.”
Jones said they raised just over $330,000 during the 2021 campaign. He set the 2022 goal at $500,000.
“It’s 100% funded. So, it means that every dollar raised through Paceline, 100% of every dollar goes to the cause. It stays local and it benefits some really innovative cancer research here, world class research is going on our doorstep,” he said.
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Other grants went to:
Dr. Malcolm Bevel, Racial Disparities in Food Deserts, Food Swamps, and Multiple Cancer Outcomes: A Mixed Methods Analysis; Dr. Yukai He, Developing novel intermediate-avidity CAR-Ts for hepatocellular carcinoma immunotherapy; Dr. Hasan Korkaya, Development of novel HSP70 small molecule peptidomimetic inhibitors in syngeneic models of breast cancer; Dr. Nahid Mivechi, Determine the Potential of Targeting Heat Shock Factor HSF1 in Acute Myelogenous Leukemia; Dr. Yuen Keng Ng, Mobile Cancer Molecular Biology Lab Experience for Local High School Outreach.
The next Paceline ride will be October 16. It will begin at SRP Park in North Augusta and end at the Augusta Common. Registrations are being taken at: https://fundraise.pacelineride.org/
There will also be an opportunity to volunteer the day of the ride. Those registrations will be taken beginning in August.
Dana Lynn McIntyre is a general assignment reporter for The Augusta Press. Reach her at dana@theaugustapress.com
