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In 2009 and 2007, Stuart Le Grice was nominated for the NCI Outstanding Mentor Award and was selected as a Mentor of Merit. Dr. Le Grice received one of the highest rankings in a competitive review in which nominees were "judged on their records as mentors; their accessibility to trainees; their ability to communicate and provide instruction and constructive feedback; their capacity to provide an environment conducive to science and learning; their propensity to give credit to trainees and promote visibility of their work; and their attention to the career development needs of those they mentor." NCI Director John Niederhuber will present Dr. Le Grice with the Mentor of Merit citation at the NCI Director's Awards ceremony in October 2009.
The NIH Fellows Award for Research Excellence (FARE) acknowledges outstanding
scientific research performed by intramural postdoctoral fellows. The award
is sponsored by the NIH Fellows Committee, the Scientific Directors, the NIH Office
of Research on Women's Health, and the NIH Office of Intramural Training and Education,
and is funded by the Scientific Directors and the Office of Research on Women's
Health. Awards are based on scientific merit, originality, experimental
design, and overall quality/presentation of the abstracts.
Muthukumar Balasubramaniam The following DRP Fellows were FARE awardees in 2006-2009: Catherine
Adamson (2009) 
Shown
from left to right: Patricia Henry, Galina Nikolenko, Joyce Rudick (Director
of Programs and Management, NIH Office of Research on Women's Health), Michael
Gottesman (NIH Deputy Director for Intramural Research), and Yeshitila Friew. NCI-Frederick Scientific Library Student Science Jeopardy Tournament Brittany Ashe and David Kaiser-Jones won the 3rd Annual NCI-Frederick Scientific Library Student Science Jeopardy Tournament in 2009, competing against 11 other 2-student teams in the traditional Jeopardy "answer and question" format. Brittany and David are students working in Stuart Le Grice's group with mentors Jason Rausch and Michal Legiewicz, respectively.  Shown
from left to right: Jason Rausch, Brittany Ashe, 2009 NIH Merit Award
Stuart Le Grice (HIV Drug Resistance Program, NCI) was nominated
and selected to receive a 2009 NIH Merit Award with Robert Yarchoan (HIV and AIDS
Malignancy Branch, NCI). Robert Wiltrout, Director of the Center for Cancer
Research, NCI, nominated Drs. Le Grice and Yarchoan for this Group Award, titled
HIV/AIDS and HIV Malignancy Leadership Group, for leadership in promoting and
supporting research in HIV/AIDS and HIV-associated malignancies in the NCI. NCI Director's Intramural Innovation Awards
Nancy
P.Y. Chung was awarded a travel scholarship to present her research findings
at the 2009 Keystone Symposia on HIV Immunobiology: From Infection to Immune Control.
Benjamin
Luttge was awarded the Young Investigator Award for his oral presentation
at the 2008 International Feline Retrovirus Research Symposium in Vienna, Austria.
Mary
Kearney was awarded the Benedict T. DeCicco Award for Excellence in Graduate
Research in 2008 by the Biology Faculty of the Catholic University of America.
Benjamin Luttge won a travel award for the best oral presentation
at the 2008
The following DRP fellows and student trainees won poster awards for their presentations Michal
Legiewicz (2008)
Taichiro Takemura was awarded a Postdoctoral Fellowship from
2007 to 2009 by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. The fellowship
program sponsored by this society supports meritorious biomedical research projects
undertaken in NIH laboratories by Japanese postdoctoral researchers. Fellowships
are awarded after a competitive review of research proposals.
Mario Chin was awarded a scholarship to present his findings
at the 2007 IAS Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention in Sydney,
Australia.
Mary
Kearney was awarded a travel scholarship in 2007 to present her research
findings at the International HIV Drug Resistance Workshop.
Nancy
Chung and Alok Mulky were awarded travel scholarships
and their abstracts were selected for oral presentation at the 2007 American Society
for Virology Meeting.
Zandrea
Ambrose won Young Investigator Awards in 2006 and 2007 and Catherine
Adamson won a Young Investigator Award in 2007 to present their research
findings at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections.
In 2006, Jean L. Mbisa and Catherine Adamson won two of the three available travel fellowships awarded by the HIV & Cancer Virology Faculty, Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute. Last modified: 28 September 2009 | ... |
In
2009, Jason Rausch received a $10,000 NCI Director's Intramural
Innovation Award for his application entitled "Incorporating Unnatural Amino Acids
into the Pol V Mutasome for Photocrosslinking and Single-Molecule FRET."
Dr. Rausch's innovation entails the expression, purification, and utilization
of proteins containing unnatural amino acids to explore structural and mechanistic
aspects of DNA repair in unprecedented ways and using state-of-the-art technologies.
These technologies can be applied to a wide variety of experimental systems, including
those used for drug screening, in which the presence of numerous or catalytically
critical cysteines otherwise prohibits conventional protein labeling. This
award is the second that Dr. Rausch has received through the NCI Director's Intramural
Innovation Award Program (see the text below for a description of his first award).
Michal
Legiewicz (Stuart Le Grice group) and Arti Santhanam
(Nancy Colburn group) were awarded $10,000 from the NCI Director's Intramural
Innovation Award Program in 2008 for their proposal "Structural Determinants Within
the 5'-UTR of Cancer-Relevant mRNAs Regulated at the Level of Translation."
The NCI Director's Intramural Innovation Award Program is designed to support
the development of highly innovative approaches and technology aimed at significant
cancer-related problems. Deregulation of protein synthesis is an early event
in cancer progression. In recent years, considerable effort has been focused
on translation as a molecular target for both cancer prevention and therapy.
The novel tumor suppressor PDCD4 functions by inhibiting the RNA helicase activity
of the eukaryotic initiation factor eIF4A and hence the efficient translation
of specific oncoproteins. Applying the innovative RNA mapping technology
SHAPE to determine structural signatures within the 5'-UTR of various mRNAs will
explain why only select mRNAs are targets of PDCD4. In high throughput,
SHAPE will allow examination of multiple RNAs simultaneously or the same RNA under
various conditions. This unique feature makes it possible to monitor minor
RNA structural response to the presence/activity of protein factors at different
concentrations and test the significance of other co-factors that are important
for RNA structure (e.g., divalent cations) or for protein enzymatic function (e.g.,
ATP). No other technology offers this unusual combination of sensitivity,
flexibility for applied conditions, and high throughput. High-throughput
identification of structural signatures defining oncogenic mRNAs will have tremendous
potential in the discovery and design of novel, powerful anticancer drugs.
In 2007, Chandravanu (CV) Dash successfully competed for a Howard
Temin Pathway to Independence (PI) Award (K99/R00) from the National Institute
on Drug Abuse for his proposal "Role of Nucleic Acid Structure in HIV-1 Replication."
The award provides up to five years of support consisting of two phases.
The initial phase will provide one to two years of mentored support (up to $90,000)
for highly promising postdoctoral research scientists. This phase will be
followed by up to three years of independent support (up to $249,000) contingent
on securing an independent research position. The primary goal of the PI
Award Program is to increase and maintain a strong cohort of new and talented
NIH-supported independent investigators. 
