2017 Undergraduate Student Pelotonia Scholars

Project – Breast Cancer Survivors’ Depression & Heart Rate Variability: Risks for Heightened Pain Sensitivity

Summary – Test the relationships among low Heart Rate Variability (HRV), depression and pain sensitivity, with the goal of finding out if low-HRV and depression have something to do with how severely patients experience pain.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 25 miles

Project – Improving the Effectiveness of an Online Intervention for Major Depressive Disorders in Cancer Patients

Summary – An online intervention may be preferable for some cancer patients who are already inundated with appointments or have limited mobility. Thus, optimizing an online intervention for major depressive disorder has the potential to significantly improve the quality of life of cancer patients.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 25 miles

Project – Construction, Expression & Functional Evaluation of Chimeric NKG2D Receptor in Murine NK Cells

Summary – Once the BIKE compound goes to clinical trials, it can be used to target different types of cancer.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 25 miles

Project – Effects of Therapeutic Targeting of Cancer Associated Fibroblasts on Extracellular Matrix Remodeling in an Engineered Tumor Stroma Model

Summary – Building physiologically relevant models of the tumor microenvironment, in order to quantify the effects that different therapeutic treatments have on the microenvironment. Enabling researchers to better design drug treatments to effectively combat the effects of cancer, and as a platform for testing drugs to ultimately speed the process of developing new treatments.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Elucidating Transcriptional Regulation of an Ets Factor Involved in the Egfr Feedback Loop

Summary – Understanding the regulation of an important transcription factor, and pathways important for Ets regulation in humans. Help identify regulators that are targets for cancer therapy in the future, and understand regulation of Ets factors at a fundamental level.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Effect of BRD4 Inhibition on Levels/Functions of MDS Cells

Summary – Finding ways to reduce tumor-induced immune suppression and allow patients to respond better to immune based therapies.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Exploring SMAD3 in Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma

Summary – Study and define the mechanisms involved with the genetic variants specific for thyroid cancer, which could shed light on future study of the disease or treatments.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Investigation of Aromatase Inhibitors in Endometrial Cancer Cells in Combination with Dual TORC 1/2 Inhibitor

Summary – Improve the understanding of which patients could benefit most from a treatment for recurrent and metastatic endometrial cancer, by identifying markers of response to this treatment.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Virtual Rider

Project – Development of Gene Editing Platform to Construct Liver Tumor Model in Adult Mice

Summary – Better study cancer by creating tumor models in mice that better reflect the nature of tumors in people. Lead to helpful information on gene editing systems and their potential for treating cancer itself.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Cardio-Oncology: The Mechanism of TKI-Induced Heart Failure

Summary – Improve the lab longevity and quality of life for renal cell carcinoma patients and advanced non-adipocytic soft tissue sarcoma patients being treated with pazopanib.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 40 miles

Project – The Role of Gut-Microbiome in Chemotherapy-Induced Behavioral Comorbidities

Summary – Researching what causes depression, anxiety and impairments in learning and memory for cancer survivors, and how to ameliorate them, to improve their quality of life.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 25 miles

Project – The Impact of Severity Scale Systems on Patient Treatment, Cost, and Outcome

Summary – Study whether or not hospital protocols can have an impact on costs and clinical outcomes of cancer patients. Help policy-makers, administrators and physicians find the most effective and least costly care methods, which ultimately increases cancer treatment efficiency and ensures better treatment for patients across the hospital.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Virtual Rider

Project – Determining the Role of Point Mutation E566A in Cholangiocarcinoma Therapy Resistance

Summary – Study the resistance pathways of cholangiocarcinoma to avoid the ongoing cycle of response to a new therapy followed by resistance, in order to develop novel combinations of therapy that bypass resistance mechanisms. This would avoid putting patients through cycles of response and progression, and help them live longer lives.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Single Nucleotide Polymorphism Disruptions in mRNA Secondary Structure in Oncogenes as Selective Pressures and a Means to Profile Different Cancer Types

Summary – Study how oncogenes and tumor suppressors have evolved and had their sequences selected for, with possible understanding of correlations between mRNA folding and the actual etiology of cancer progression.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Determination of the Safety and Efficacy of the Novel Oncolytic Herpes-Simplex-1 Virus, Mut-3?ICP6 for the Treatment of Pediatric Neuroblastoma

Summary – Study the effect of oncolytic viral therapy, with emphasis on reducing the amount of life-long side effects that traditional cancer treatment often involves in pediatric patients.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Defective Processing of Mutated tRNAs by Mitochondrial RNase P as a Molecular Basis for Some Forms of Liver & Brain Cancer

Summary – Study the processing of Mitochondrial tRNA mutations, which is one of the hallmarks found in most cancer.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – IL-6 Blockade Combined with MEK Inhibition in Cancer-Induced Cachexia

Summary – Research into a novel combinational therapy to combat cancer-induced cachexia, which is a syndrome characterized by loss of skeletal muscle and adipose tissue that cannot be reversed by nutritional intervention, and is responsible for significant morbidity and mortality in cancer patients.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 100 miles

Project – Effects of Depression & Treatment Type on Physical Fitness of Breast Cancer Survivors

Summary – Addressing the prevalence of depression in the breast cancer community, and examining the role it plays in physical fitness, in order to keep women healthy, both physiologically and mentally.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 25 miles

Project – Photosensitizers for Targeting Tumor-Associated Macrophages in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer

Summary – Develop and verify a method to quantify apohemoglobin in solution, in order to analyze the level and state of hemolysis and determine the amount of free heme in the patient.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 25 miles

Project – The Role of microRNA-155 on Cellular Metabolism in NK Cells to Facilitate Interferon-Gamma Production

Summary – Test that miR-155 induced upregulation of IFN-γ occurs through metabolic reprogramming of NK cells in vitro by comprehensively measuring the metabolic signature NK cells overexpressing miR-155 through gene/protein expression and Seahorse metabolic flux assays.

Project – Role of STAT3 in Hypoxic Ovarian Cancer: Potential Therapeutic Target

Summary – Investigating novel drugs that have the potential to be incorporated into the clinical setting, in order to give physicians more resources to fight ovarian cancer.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Isolation of the Spatial Effects of S1P and VEGF on Tumor Angiogenesis and Vascular Permeability

Project – The Relationship Between Ancestral Background and Frequency of Canonical Lung Adenocarcinoma Driver Mutations in Brazilian Patients

Summary – Study the use of a patient’s relative ancestry to infer what mutations he or she is likely to have at specific genes. This then allows for a reduction of the cost of Next-Generation Sequencing, allowing easier access to novel, targeted therapies for underrepresented communities.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Investigating the role of ETS1 in development and function of NK cells

Summary – Add to our existing knowledge of an important immune cell involved in tumor lysis and surveillance.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Development of RNA Transcript Degradation Modeling in Lc/scRNA-seq with Applications in CLL Samples

Summary – Increasing our understanding of transcriptomic measurement can aid in future studies of cancer at the single cell level.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 45 miles

Project – Characterization of Unexpected Activities of the ABD2 Domain of Human Plastins

Summary – Study of metastasis and L-plastin’s potential involvement in its mechanisms, in order to help the cancer research collective target areas that could provide a base of knowledge to procure a potential novel therapy that focuses on controlling metastasis.

2017 Pelotonia Participant – Virtual Rider