1. Opportunities for Scientific Engagement with Program Directors Nas Kuhn, Ph.D. Division of Cancer Biology New Grantee Workshop March 18, 2015 http://dcb.nci.nih.gov/

2. Roles of the NCI Program Directors (PDs) I.Inform NCI and NIH leadership of notable research advances II.Plan scientific workshops III.Organize sessions at scientific conferences IV.Draft funding opportunity announcements V.Manage large programs and working groups NCI PDs have several roles in addition to stewardship of grants

3. I. Inform NCI and NIH leadership of notable research advances NCI Congressional Budget Justification or response to Congressional inquiry Internal journal clubs and seminars Share knowledge on research advances with NCI and NIH colleagues o Strategic planning o Set priorities o Coordinate research across different fields o Identify gaps in research o Identify areas of potential synergy between groups or scientific areas Information on scientific achievements may be used by an NCI PD in a variety of contexts

4. II. Plan scientific workshops Intent of NCI PD to plan workshops o Gain knowledge on the status of the field o Identify where gaps exist o Determine if NCI coordination or resources are needed o Convene investigators from disparate disciplines as needed As an investigator, you may play various roles at NCI workshops o Participant o Discussant o Speaker o Co-chair NCI sponsors scientific workshops on topics that appear to be emerging areas of interest or areas that might need coordination

5. II. Plan scientific workshops NCI Division of Cancer Biology Workshops in 2014 1.Applying Chromatin Biology to Understand Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma (February 18-19, 2014) 2.Biomimetic Tissue Engineered Systems for Advancing Cancer Research (February 26, 2014) 3.Unfolded Protein Response in Cancer Development and Progression Workshop (June 5-6, 2014) 4.Early Stage Investigators in Cancer System Biology Steering Committee Meeting (September 4-5, 2014) 5.RNA Editing, Epitransciptomics and Processing in Cancer Progression Workshop (September 10, 2014) 6.UN Cell Modulus Workshop (September 11, 2014) 7.Prospective Outlook of Mechanics in Oncology (September 11-12, 2014) 8.Mitochondrial Information Transfer (Mito IT) Strategic Workshop (September 23- 24, 2014) 9.NCI-Basic and Translational Applications of Mouse Models: A Workshop on Reliable Guidance for Model Selection (September 24-25, 2014) 10.BD2K Game Developers Think Tank Workshop (December 8-9, 2014)

6. III. Organize sessions at scientific conferences NCI PDs are often involved in co-organizing sessions at scientific conferences o Grantsmanship o Introduce NCI programs and funding opportunities o Convene investigators from disparate disciplines ‒ e.g., engage cancer researchers with engineers and physicists

7. III. Organize sessions at scientific conferences: A few examples in 2014 AACR 2014 – NIH Grants Session: Changes in Review, Funding, and Funding Opportunities at the NCI Suresh Mohla (NCI) ASCB Special Interest Subgroups 2014 – The dynamic interface between cancer cells and their physical environment Mike Espey (NCI) and Dan Sacket (NICHD) ASME Nanoengineering for Medicine and Biology 2014 – Bioengineering for medical diagnostics, therapeutics, and imaging Larry Nagahara (NCI) and Nas Kuhn (NCI)

8. IV. Draft funding opportunity announcements (FOAs): Selected list of FOAs Physical Sciences – Oncology Network o PAR-15-021: U01 Projects and PAR-14-169: U54 Centers Oncology Models Forum o PAR-14-240: R01 Collaborative projects New Approaches to Synthetic Lethality for Mutant KRas-Dependent Cancers o PAR-14-314: U01 Projects Collaborative Research in Integrative Cancer Biology o PAR-13-184: U01 Collaborative projects Early-Stage Development of Informatics Technology o PAR-12-288: U01 Projects http://dcb.nci.nih.gov/http://grants.nih.gov/ Targeted FOAs are drafted because PDs have identified a gap and a potential opportunity to move the field forward by soliciting targeted research

9. V. Manage large programs and working groups: A few examples Integrative Cancer Biology Program (ICBP) 12 Centers for Cancer Systems Biology (CCSB) and 8 Collaborative projects Tumor Microenvironment Network (TMEN) 11 TMEN Centers and 10 Collaborative projects Oncology Models Forum (OMF) 1 Resource-related research project and pending projects Physical Sciences-Oncology Network (PS-ON) Pending Physical Sciences-Oncology Centers and Projects Consortia are often formed when a new community is needed to come together, share resources, expertise, where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts

10. V. Manage large programs and working groups: A few more examples Informatics Technology for Cancer Research (ITCR) 13 Projects and 10 resource centers Barrett’s Esophagus Translational Research Network (BETRNet) 3 Research centers and 1 coordinating center NCI Provocative Questions (PQ) 173 Projects NIH Common Fund Programs 4D nucleome Big data to knowledge Bioinformatics and computational biology Epigenomics Extracellular RNA communication Library of integrated network-based cellular signatures Single cell analysis PDs collaborate across the NCI and the NIH to manage large programs

11. Summary: Many opportunities exist for scientific engagement with NCI PDs I.Inform NCI and NIH leadership of notable research advances II.Plan scientific workshops III.Organize sessions at scientific conferences IV.Draft funding initiatives V.Manage large programs and working groups http://dcb.nci.nih.gov/

12. Thank you!