The Molecular Therapeutics of Cancer Gordon Conference strives to bring research scientists working at the molecular and cellular level together with scientists whose efforts are focused on model organisms, preclinical evaluation of experimental therapeutics and clinical research. Meeting participants represents a diverse range of interests, spanning the pharmaceutical industry, biotechnology companies, and clinical and academic institutions. The meeting seeks to promote advancements in the treatment of human cancer through the presentation of novel, unpublished work, and to focus on the ways these advancements can be brought to the service of patient care. The informal nature of Gordon Research Conferences and the strong emphasis placed on high-caliber science presented with though-provoking and insightful commentary ensures a highly interactive meeting that stimulates discussion and new perspectives on drug design and development of novel therapeutics. This application seeks funds to partially support the year 2003 conference, which will emphasize technological advances in the design and development of chemothera-peutic agents and novel drug targets. Emerging opportunities in the use of proteomics and functional genomics for diagnosis and mechanistic studies of drug action, structure-based drug design, model system of identifying new drug targets and mechanisms of drug resistance, and the clinical development of signaling inhibitors and chromatin modulators will highlight future directions for progress.