Timothy Chapman
03/06/2023
The Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) awarded nine University of Texas Institutions 37 grants totaling $65.4 million with UTRGV receiving $6 million.
According to cprit.state.tx.us website “CPRIT offers several funding opportunities for promising cancer research, product development, and prevention programs. All funding opportunities are announced through formal Requests for Applications (RFAs) and applications must be submitted through the online application receipt system”.
Professor of the Department of Immunology and Microbiology at the UTRGV School of Medicine and the founding director of UTRGV’s South Texas Center of Excellence in Cancer Research (ST-CECR). Dr. Sabash Chauhan Was the principal investigator of the CPRIT award, and said this is a historic achievement for the UTRGV school of medicine.
“This grant is basically for developing or escalating cancer research in the valley. So we will have a lot more leverage now to support cancer researchers, our junior investigators and hopefully we will be able to recruit some more folks,” Chauhan said.
He said this grant along with the other improvements the UTRGV School of Medicine has been receiving recently are greatly improving the health care available for cancer research and treatment in the Rio Grande Valley, but they still have a lot of work to do before becoming a world class facility.
“So right now we are in a phase where I can say we are just in a building phase right now. We are nowhere close to the finish line yet or we can say we are nowhere close to say we have really a world class facility right now, but at least we are step by step we are making progress, day by day,” Chauhan said.
Certified General Surgeon at UT Health RGV Dr. Vijian Dhevan said there are things you don’t see in any other parts of the country but here in Rio Grande Valley, such as people with very advanced forms of cancer or even unique cases like people that have two different types of cancer at the same time, this is why he sees this grant as a big deal when it comes to treating cancer in the valley.
“It may seem this is just a research grant, no, this is gonna sprout other things that can take us down the pathway of looking at different facets, different things to allow us to one day have a very robust system of one prevention, two detection, three treatment,” Dhevan said.
Associate Professor for the Department of Immunology and Microbiology at UT Health RGV Dr. Muralli Yallapu said this grant would also bring opportunities to further educate students about cancer.
“So for me particularly, it brings us a lot more venues not just doing research but also it is going to give us the opportunity to educate local community and participate in the research our students in UTRGV they can paticipate in the research they can see how they can utilize our resources, facilities that we have since 2019,” Yallapu said.
To learn more about UT Health RGV you can visit https://uthealthrgv.org/
