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Susan G. Komen® has awarded over $875,000 in research funding to UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.

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Pam Kohl, executive director of Komen North Carolina to the Coast said, “The grants bring Komen’s total research investment in North Carolina to nearly $31 million since 1982. Since 1997, the Affiliate has funded nearly $15 million to community health programs that provide screening, education, financial aid, and social and emotional support to women and families throughout our 29 county service area in Central and Eastern North Carolina.”

An award of $450,000 was given to Michael Emanuele, Ph.D., to apply large-scale technologies which will systematically identify proteins that are broken down and recycled by the E3 Ubiquitin protein family. Any differences that occur in cancer cells compared to normal cells will help to identify possible therapeutic targets that promote cancer growth, with a focus on finding novel therapies for triple negative breast cancer.

$200,000 in continued funding to Komen Scholar Lisa Carey, M.D. is developing a method to rapidly assess the genetic traits of the primary breast tumor and compare it to those found elsewhere in the body (metastases) in order to uncover which genetic changes occurred that resulted in the development of metastatic disease.

Continued funding of $175,000 has been awarded to Komen Scholar Claire Dees, M.D., M.Sc., will continue to build a strategic infrastructure that will encourage greater numbers of patients with metastatic breast cancer to enroll in narrowly focused Phase 1 clinical trials which will facilitate additional research into treatments for metastatic breast cancer patients and improving patient access to new drugs.

More than $50,000 in funding to Shelley Earp, M.D., to carry out Phase III of the Carolina Breast Cancer Study (CBCS) – the largest population-based study of breast cancer in African-American and Caucasian women – which will involve obtaining clinical treatment and outcomes data from this population while working with healthcare providers across North Carolina to get treatment records. The study would be the first to address how treatment decisions, access to care, and financial or geographic barriers impact breast cancer.

The Komen North Carolina Triangle to the Coast (NCTC) Affiliate serves 29 counties in central and eastern North Carolina; holding two annual Race for the Cure events in Raleigh (June 13, 2015) and Wilmington (March 7, 2015). Since its first Race in 1997, nearly $15 million has been raised and used locally for breast cancer research, education, advocacy, health services and social programs. Seventy-five percent of the net proceeds generated by the Affiliate stay in the service area. In 2014, $738,000 was granted to provide a continuum of breast health services to underinsured and uninsured women from the Triangle to the Coast.