Making a Real Impact

There is a catch 22 inherent in scientific research.

Scientists need to build basic research tools and publish discoveries in order to attract the attention of major funding sources such as the National Cancer Institute (NCI). But the NCI will only fund research that already has these tools in place, and has already been published in reputable journals. As a result, worthy and potentially life saving research is often abandoned, leaving behind ideas and potential treatments that could make a critical difference for patients.

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Over $1 million in research grants for promising investigators.

We are addressing this problem by focusing our research dollars on cancers that are not only rare, but also suffer from a lack of funding and basic research tools, and as a result, have no treatments and poor rates of survival.

Scroll down to learn more about what we’ve been able to accomplish, and how.

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Two clinical trials directly informed by research we funded.

It doesn’t take a million dollars to make a difference.

  • We provide seed funding to jumpstart research programs for rare cancers where even the most basic research building blocks do not yet exist.
  • We accomplish this with targeted grants that support young researchers whose work might otherwise go unfunded, and for whom modest grants have a major impact.

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Eleven papers published in major scientific journals.

Collaboration, not competition.

  • We build close relationships with researchers and communicate with them often, allowing us to drive and participate in the research process.
  • We facilitate formal and informal collaborations between researchers in varied disciplines, creating unconventional partnerships that accelerate the research timeline and lead to discoveries that would not otherwise occur.

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Seven fellowships funded for medical students studying rare cancers.

We’re in this for the long haul.

  • We commit to research projects over the long term to nurture and facilitate discovery.
  • Our model is working. In just five years, research initiated by TargetCancer Foundation has been published in major scientific journals including Nature and translated to several clinical trials, giving hope to patients who previously had no treatment options.

Most importantly, discoveries made in rare cancer have the potential to impact all cancers, especially as cancer causing genetic mutations are identified across multiple cancers.