In last six months, after assuming the tenure track investigator position, I have been working on establishing a pancreatic cancer research program in the laboratory. We have initiated the large-scale mRNA and microRNA (miRNA) expression analysis of 25 pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) samples and paired surrounding non-tumorous pancreas from the patients with epidemiological profile and 3 normal pancreas from non-cancer donors that have been collected through the NCI-University of Maryland Resource Contract. We also have obtained a set of 40 PDAC samples from collaborators in Germany. The two sets of samples are being used as test and validation cohorts in our studies to identify novel biomarkers for the disease. We are currently preparing a protocol and questionnaire to initiate the case-control study of pancreatic cancer in the greater Baltimore area.
