DCEG News Updates
The latest news and research findings from the Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics.
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Postdoctoral fellow Rebecca Landy, Ph.D., predoctoral fellow Corey Young, M.S., and senior investigator Hormuzd Katki, Ph.D., in the Biostatistics Branch found that the draft 2020 lung cancer screening guidelines by the United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) may increase racial/ethnic disparities. However, augmenting the guidelines to include people eligible according to the Life-Years From Screening-Computed Tomography model may reduce disparities.
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Dr. Connelly was awarded a Sallie Rosen Kaplan (SRK) Postdoctoral Fellowship for 2021. The goal of the SRK program is to help prepare female postdoctoral fellows at the NCI for the transition to independent biomedical research careers. Fellows receive additional mentoring and networking opportunities and attend seminars and workshops designed to strengthen leadership, time management, and self-promotional skills.
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Rebecca Troisi, Sc.D., staff scientist in the Trans-Divisional Research Program, and collaborators examined cancer incidence associated with chromosomal and non-chromosomal congenital anomalies in a large Nordic population-based case-control study. Findings were published in BMJ on December 2, 2020.
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Allan Hildesheim, Ph.D., senior investigator and former chief of the Infections and Immunoepidemiology Branch (IIB) built a multidisciplinary research program focused on the interplay of infection, immunity, and inflammation on cancer risk and helped translate those findings into important advances in cancer prevention, risk stratification, and screening.
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The COVID-19 Seroprevalence Studies Hub (SeroHub) was developed by researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Cancer Institute, and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, parts of the National Institutes of Health, to provide an interactive dashboard to compare COVID-19 seroprevalence studies across the country.
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The NCI Intramural Continuing Umbrella of Research Experiences (iCURE) program offers mentored research experiences to qualified individuals and aims to support the career progress of its scholars toward research independence, as well as foster and sustain diversity in the biomedical research pipeline. In 2020, DCEG welcomed six new iCURE scholars.
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Over the past 48 years at the NCI, Dr. Silverman has made numerous seminal contributions to the field of occupational cancer epidemiology, including the evaluation of the carcinogenic effects of diesel exhaust.
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Minkyo Song, Ph.D., and colleagues estimated the potential years of life lost due to premature death from cancer among Americans aged 75 and younger. They report common malignancies contributed to the largest number of years lost overall: lung cancer, followed by colorectal and breast cancer.
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Stephen Chanock introduced the Trans-Divisional Research Program (TDRP) and recognized recipients of the Kelly Government Distinguished Achievement Awards, 2021 NCI Director’s Innovation Awards and DCEG Fellows Award for Research Excellence (DFARE) at the 2020 DCEG summer and fall town hall meetings.
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Jonathan Hofmann, Ph.D., tenure-track investigator, and Mark Purdue, Ph.D., senior investigator, in the Occupational and Environmental Epidemiology Branch, participated in the Workshop on Federal Government Human Health PFAS Research, October 26-27, 2020, hosted by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology.
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DCEG prides itself as an optimal training environment for those interested in conducting research in cancer epidemiology by championing innovative opportunities to obtain integrated scientific and career training. 10 current fellows share their training experience in DCEG.
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The Laboratory of Translational Genomics, the Laboratory of Genetic Susceptibility, and the Cancer Genomics Research Laboratory joined the rest of the Division staff as occupants of a new constructed state of the art laboratory and staff building at Shady Grove.
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Neil Caporaso studied genetic and environmental factors influencing lung cancer, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, and related familial hematologic disorders over his 37-year career at the National Cancer Institute.
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Underpinning nearly every research study conducted by DCEG is a collaboration with investigators in the Biostatistics Branch (BB). While highly trained and experienced epidemiologists can and do design their own analytic plans and calculate statistical power and other parameters, biostatisticians in BB ensure the statistical validity and strength of all DCEG research while actively engaging in the development of novel methods and tools.
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Dr. Wilcox, Scientist Emeritus in the Epidemiology Branch, Reproductive Epidemiology Group at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences delivered the Sholom Wacholder Distinguished Lecture on The Cost of False-Positive Results: A Personal History.
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Daily, low-dose use of aspirin by women younger than 70 may be associated with reduced risk of ovarian cancer. These findings were published in September 2020 in the journal Gynecologic Oncology.
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Jennifer Loud, adult nurse practitioner and assistant chief in the Clinical Genetics Branch, retired after 27 years of NCI service.
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Shahinaz Gadalla, M.D., Ph.D., Ludmila Prokunina-Olsson, Ph.D., and colleagues find acute leukemia patients receiving a hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT) from donors with IFNL4-null genotype experience reduced risk of death from non-relapse related causes. Findings published October 2020 in Lancet Haematology.
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An international team of experts led by Dr. Prokunina-Olsson identified dACE2, a novel isoform of ACE2 (the cell receptor used by the SARS-CoV-2 virus to infect the body). The new report suggests that production of dACE2 and not ACE2 is affected by the presence of interferons, contributed by treatment or various viral infections, including SARS-CoV-2.
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Lauren Hurwitz and Michael Cook in the Metabolic Epidemiology Branch proposed a standardized definition for aggressive prostate cancer for use in epidemiologic research and compared its performance using data from the NCI SEER-18 database. The findings were published October 3, 2020, in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.