NCI and KCRP Grants
Following, we rank the kidney cancer programs by amount of funding from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and, in addition, the recently funded Kidney Cancer Program of the Department of Defense, which represent the two major federal government funded cancer research funding areas. It will not only give the reader an inkling of which institutions do research in kidney cancer, but it helps us monitor where the next advances in kidney cancer research will come from.
For NCI grants, one-quarter of the budget goes to intramural grants to the NCI itself. The NCI does both basic research and works on clinical development. It does a lot of research on those cancers that industry basically ignores such as non-clear cell RCC. In fact, it was an NCI researcher that found out that the c-Met gene is a driver of papillary renal cell cancer. Following the NCI are UTSW and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, which lead the two kidney cancer SPORE programs. Beth Israel partners with Dana Farber and Harvard University in the Boston SPORE, which has been in existence for a number of years now. UTSW was awarded a SPORE program ($2.5 million per year for five years) by the NCI a couple of years ago.
The Boston SPORE, along with others, identified c-Met as a target in clear cell RCC and provide the principal investigator the Phase I trial of cabozantinib. They have been focused on immunotherapy for many years and, early on, identified PD-1 as a target in kidney cancer and searched for and found an antibody to inhibit it. Unfortunately, it didn’t work in RCC but has been successful in melanoma. Otherwise, they helped keep industry focused on kidney cancer and led the first trial in kidney cancer for nivolumab (Opdivo). They are now working with UTSW and industry to develop a molecule to inhibit HIF-2, a major driver of clear cell RCC.
NCI Grants
| Institution | Grants | Total Grant Amount |
|---|---|---|
| National Cancer Institute (intramural grants) | 73 | $11,596,791 |
| University of Texas Southwestern (UTSW) | 8 | 3,247,652 |
| Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center | 2 | 2,698,025 |
| University of Wisconsin – Madison | 7 | 1,999,461 |
| University of Pennsylvania | 7 | 1,667,114 |
| Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia | 3 | 1,516,438 |
| Stanford University | 4 | 1,371,030 |
| University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill | 12 | 1,287,275 |
| Vanderbilt University | 9 | 1,172,911 |
| University of Utah | 12 | 1,160,203 |
| Massachusetts General Hospital | 2 | 1,114,632 |
| Purdue University/Indiana University (Indianapolis) | 11 | 1,030,534 |
| Dana Farber Cancer Institute | 9 | 1,000,584 |
| University of Alabama – Birmingham | 7 | 877,206 |
| St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital | 5 | 858,874 |
| Boston Children’s Hospital | 2 | 816,073 |
| Northwestern University – Chicago | 5 | 788,247 |
| University of California San Francisco (UCSF) | 4 | 744,462 |
| Fox Chase Cancer Institute | 7 | 731,062 |
| University of Washington | 6 | 720,707 |
| Northern California Institute of Res. and Educ. | 2 | 701,348 |
| University of Florida | 1 | 700,887 |
| Oregon Health & Science University | 6 | 541,992 |
| Purdue University | 3 | 432,399 |
| University of Michigan | 5 | 410,534 |
| Leidos Biomendical Research | 1 | 406,459 |
| Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research | 1 | 394,875 |
| Cleveland Clinic | 1 | 376,829 |
| Texas Tech University Health Science Center | 1 | 376,776 |
| Columbia University | 5 | 358,120 |
| University of Minnesota | 5 | 343,047 |
| NRG Oncology Foundation | 2 | 340,221 |
| Mayo Clinic – Jacksonville, FL | 1 | 334,519 |
| University of Cincinnati | 1 | 291,194 |
| Yale University | 3 | 223,547 |
| Brigham & Women’s Hospital | 2 | 222,902 |
| Southern Illinois University | 1 | 212,906 |
| University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) | 3 | 203,137 |
| University of California Santa Barbara | 1 | 191,875 |
| Johns Hopkins University | 1 | 185,288 |
| New York University | 1 | 180,176 |
| Rutgers University | 1 | 155,988 |
| Queen’s University – Kingston, Ont | 1 | 148,328 |
| University of Texas MD Anderson | 4 | 137,989 |
| National Institutes of Health | 1 | 125,000 |
| Harvard University | 2 | 116,819 |
| Mayo Clinic – Rochester, MN | 5 | 108,039 |
| University of California Irvine | 2 | 93,878 |
| Children’s Research Institute | 1 | 87,646 |
| Case Western Reserve | 7 | 85,825 |
| Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center | 2 | 76,117 |
| University of South Florida | 1 | 74,750 |
| Massachusetts Institute of Technology | 1 | 71,453 |
| Sloan-Kettering Cancer Research | 3 | 70,621 |
| University of Pittsburgh | 2 | 66,505 |
| Weill Medical College of Cornell University | 1 | 44,044 |
| University of Colorado | 1 | 38,448 |
| Augusta University | 2 | 33,744 |
| Ohio State University | 1 | 32,677 |
| University of Chicago | 1 | 31,720 |
| Univerity of North Dakota | 1 | 28,228 |
| Roswell Park Cancer Institute | 1 | 21,945 |
| Emory University | 1 | 20,355 |
| Dartmouth College | 1 | 17,853 |
| Wayne State University | 1 | 15,014 |
| University of California Davis | 1 | 14,819 |
| Duke University | 1 | 9,824 |
| Total NCI Grants | 288 | $45,555,941 |
KCRP Grants
| Institution | Grants | Total Grant Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Dana-Farber Cancer Institute | 4 | $2,633,441 |
| MD Anderson Cancer Center | 2 | 1,120,000 |
| Indiana University at Indianapolis | 1 | 630,000 |
| Vanderbilt University | 1 | 628,000 |
| Wayne State University | 1 | 611,475 |
| Institute for Cancer Research | 1 | 566,149 |
| Maine Medical Center | 1 | 553,824 |
| Brigham and Women’s Hospital | 1 | 392,010 |
| Georgetown University | 1 | 194,963 |
| Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center | 1 | 131,250 |
| Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center | 1 | 128,775 |
| Baylor College of Medicine | 1 | 118,861 |
| University of North Carolina | 1 | 116,625 |
| University of Louisville | 1 | 115,500 |
| Glycomantra, Inc. | 1 | 103,013 |
| Duquesne University | 1 | 100,791 |
| National Cancer Institute | 1 | 89,700 |
| Total KCRP Grants | 21 | $8,234,377 |
