Moffitt's Dr. Said Sebti receives NCI Outstanding Investigator Award

Said M. Sebti, Ph.D., chair of the Drug Discovery Department and co-leader of the Chemical Biology and Molecular Medicine Program at Moffitt Cancer Center, has been awarded an Outstanding Investigator Award from the National Cancer Institute (NCI). The prestigious award, which provides grant funding over a seven year term, is given to well-established cancer researchers with proven track records to encourage long-term projects of unusual potential in cancer research. Dr. Sebti's award totals $6,415,284 million.

Dr. Sebti will use the funds to further his research on novel drug therapies for KRas-mutated cancers. The proposed research is highly significant, is of high priority, and has long-term relevance to NCI's mission. With mt KRas significantly contributing to human oncogenesis and patient tumor resistance to therapy, and no anticancer drugs targeting mt KRas yet available in clinic, the NCI identified targeting Ras as a high priority and has implemented a major initiative with the ultimate goal of discovering therapies that specifically target patients whose tumors harbor mt Ras. This Outstanding Investigator Award will engage in research that tackles this challenging problem on many fronts.

"I am extremely humbled by this great honor and award from the NCI that will allow us to generate significant advances in overcoming the challenges that mt KRas poses, ultimately leading to therapies that specifically target patients whose tumors harbor mt KRas,"explained Sebti.

Dr. Sebti has been at Moffitt since 1996 and has authored more than 290 journal articles on various areas of cancer research. Recently, he has been elected as a member of the National Academy of Inventors and was recognized by Nature publishing as one of top 20 translational researchers.

Provided by H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute