Merkel Cell Carcinoma (MCC) is an increasingly common skin cancer associated with ultraviolet exposure and immune suppression. Compared with malignant melanoma, MCC is twice as likely to be lethal. The landmark discovery of an MCC-associated polyomavirus offers hope of substantial progress in pathogenesis, prognostic markers, and treatment. Dr. Nghiem is a recognized leader and as of 2008, a funded patient-oriented researcher in the area of MCC. This K24 proposal will take advantage of an extensive and unique set of clinical data, tissues, and blood. This program will provide outstanding training opportunities for young clinical investigators to develop into patient-oriented researchers and allow Dr. Nghiem to focus a minimum of 50% effort on patient-oriented research and mentoring. Dr. Nghiem is a co-director of research in Dermatology and of a newly awarded NIH Training Grant in Dermatology. To provide optimal mentoring of Patient Oriented Research - trainees, Dr. Nghiem works closely with an established team of medical, surgical, and radiation oncologists at the UW and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. Of the 34 trainees that Dr. Nghiem has mentored over the past ten years, 33 remain involved in their training or have already taken a faculty position (12 trainees) at five different universities. The University of Washington provides a rich source of potential trainees for patient-oriented research and facilitates their funding, coursework and mentoring through an extensive NIH-funded Institute of Translational Health Sciences. Extensive collaborative mentoring relationships have been established to ensure effective training of mentees from various clinical disciplines in patient-oriented research. Mentees will have direct patient contact including consenting patients for tissue/blood donation and contacting them later for follow-up data. Their training will also involve the genetic, immunologic, and biostatistical outcomes analyses needed to improve our understanding of this lethal skin cancer. Although these projects focus on MCC, the training will be broadly applicable to human disease.
Three Aims (1-3) are funded through 2012 via an American Cancer Society grant:
Aim 1. Define key genetic aberrations that are recurrent in MCC, Aim 2. Develop a consensus staging system for MCC, Aim 3. Integrate clinical, histologic and molecular features into a nomogram to predict survival for MCC.
Aims 4 -6 will leverage our unique MCC resources to study the newly discovered Merkel cell polyomavirus:
Aim 4. Correlate viral status and outcome in MCC, Aim 5. Develop and employ a serologic assay to determine the prevalence of MCPyV in MCC patients and controls, and Aim 6. Define the cell-mediated immune response against the MCC-associated polyomavirus. Data from Aims 4-6 will support an application for a new NIH R01 grant to be submitted during the K24 award period.

Public Health Relevance

This proposal takes advantage of a unique collection of tissues and clinical data from an uncommon cancer, Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC), to provide an outstanding vehicle for training patient-oriented researchers. Dr. Nghiem has a proven history of commitment to and success in mentoring clinician investigators. The recent discovery of a new virus associated with MCC, combined with extensive clinical resources provide a superb opportunity to improve understanding, prognosis and therapy for MCC.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Cancer Institute (NCI)
Type
Midcareer Investigator Award in Patient-Oriented Research (K24)
Project #
5K24CA139052-03
Application #
8128686
Study Section
Subcommittee G - Education (NCI)
Program Officer
Lim, Susan E
Project Start
2009-09-29
Project End
2014-08-31
Budget Start
2011-09-01
Budget End
2012-08-31
Support Year
3
Fiscal Year
2011
Total Cost
$185,016
Indirect Cost
Name
University of Washington
Department
Internal Medicine/Medicine
Type
Schools of Medicine
DUNS #
605799469
City
Seattle
State
WA
Country
United States
Zip Code
98195
Paulson, K G; Voillet, V; McAfee, M S et al. (2018) Acquired cancer resistance to combination immunotherapy from transcriptional loss of class I HLA. Nat Commun 9:3868
Becker, Jürgen C; Stang, Andreas; Hausen, Axel Zur et al. (2018) Epidemiology, biology and therapy of Merkel cell carcinoma: conclusions from the EU project IMMOMEC. Cancer Immunol Immunother 67:341-351
Colunga, Aric; Pulliam, Thomas; Nghiem, Paul (2018) Merkel Cell Carcinoma in the Age of Immunotherapy: Facts and Hopes. Clin Cancer Res 24:2035-2043
Bhatia, Shailender; Miller, Natalie J; Lu, Hailing et al. (2018) Intratumoral G100, a TLR4 Agonist, Induces Antitumor Immune Responses and Tumor Regression in Patients with Merkel Cell Carcinoma. Clin Cancer Res :
Vandeven, Natalie; Lewis, Christopher W; Makarov, Vladimir et al. (2018) Merkel Cell Carcinoma Patients Presenting Without a Primary Lesion Have Elevated Markers of Immunity, Higher Tumor Mutation Burden, and Improved Survival. Clin Cancer Res 24:963-971
Paulson, Kelly G; Park, Song Youn; Vandeven, Natalie A et al. (2018) Merkel cell carcinoma: Current US incidence and projected increases based on changing demographics. J Am Acad Dermatol 78:457-463.e2
Stang, Andreas; Becker, Jürgen C; Nghiem, Paul et al. (2018) The association between geographic location and incidence of Merkel cell carcinoma in comparison to melanoma: An international assessment. Eur J Cancer 94:47-60
Giraldo, Nicolas A; Nguyen, Peter; Engle, Elizabeth L et al. (2018) Multidimensional, quantitative assessment of PD-1/PD-L1 expression in patients with Merkel cell carcinoma and association with response to pembrolizumab. J Immunother Cancer 6:99
Gavvovidis, Ioannis; Leisegang, Matthias; Willimsky, Gerald et al. (2018) Targeting Merkel Cell Carcinoma by Engineered T Cells Specific to T-Antigens of Merkel Cell Polyomavirus. Clin Cancer Res 24:3644-3655
Becker, Jürgen C; Stang, Andreas; DeCaprio, James A et al. (2017) Merkel cell carcinoma. Nat Rev Dis Primers 3:17077

Showing the most recent 10 out of 48 publications