Acceleration Initiative Award
Preparing promising research for clinical trials.
Promising treatment approaches can stall during preclinical development, when researchers must build the evidence and complete the development work needed before a therapy can be tested in patients. CureSearch’s Acceleration Initiative Awards focus on this critical stage, funding innovative, evidence-based research with a clear path toward clinical testing.
These three-year awards support projects that address significant unmet needs in pediatric cancer and are positioned to overcome defined barriers to treatment development, with the goal of reaching clinical trials within three years.
Active projects
Currently funded investigators
Meet the researchers leading our currently funded Acceleration Initiative projects and exploring new approaches to treating childhood cancer.
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Active
Yael Mossé, MD
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
Translation of an ALK-directed Antibody Drug Conjugate for Neuroblastoma
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Active
Joshua Breunig, PhD
Wake Forest University
Pre-clinical Testing of a Targeted Metabolic Therapeutic for G34R Glioma
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Active
John Lee, MD, PhD
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
IL-18 Armored STEAP1 CAR T-cell Therapy for Ewing Sarcoma
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Active
Gregory Friedman, MD
MD Anderson Cancer Center
Overcoming the Adverse Microenvironment of Pediatric High-Grade Gliomas
Completed projects
Explore the research portfolio.
Search or browse the full archive of previously funded investigators, institutions, and projects.
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Andrei Thomas-Tikhonenko, PhD
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
Targeting Splicing-Derived Neo-Epitopes in High-Risk Pediatric Cancers
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Andrew Kung, MD, PhD
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Integrative Analysis to Identify New Therapies for Pediatric Sarcoma
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Richard Gilbertson, MD, PhD
University of Cambridge
Targeted Therapies for High-Risk Pediatric Brain Tumor Subtypes
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Maria Grazia Roncarolo, MD
Stanford University
Cell Therapy Methods to Improve AML Patient Outcome Post Allo-HSCT
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Mary Beckerle, PhD
Huntsman Cancer Institute, University of Utah
A Novel Epigenetic Strategy to Treat Ewing Sarcoma
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William Weiss, MD, PhD
University of California, San Francisco
Overcoming Resistance in High-Risk Medulloblastoma
No completed projects match your search.
Where this award fits
The research continuum
Bringing a new cancer treatment to children is a complex journey that requires multiple steps, specialized expertise, and significant investment. CureSearch funds research across the continuum, with each award program addressing different stages of development.
- 1 Basic Research Understand cancer biology
- 2 Drug Design Identify and validate targets
- 3 Preclinical Development Evaluate safety and efficacy
- 4 Early Clinical Trials Phase I and early Phase II trials
- 5 Later Clinical Trials & Approval Phase II/III trials and regulatory review
Acceleration Initiative Award
Primary position: Preclinical Development
Funds evidence-based preclinical research with a clear path to clinical testing, with awards up to $1.5M over three years.
The next treatment starts here
Help make the next treatment possible.
Your support helps bring new treatment approaches into clinical trials for children with cancer. Together, we can invest in research that could lead to better treatments and better futures.
