The federal government’s National Institutes of Health has awarded a $1.46 million grant to Baylor professors Dr. Kevin Pinney and Dr. Mary Lynn Trawick that will help fund the pair’s research and testing of new compounds that could fight cancerous tumors.
Pinney (pictured, a Baylor professor of chemistry and biochemistry since 1993) and Trawick (a professor in the same department since 1983) have worked together for about 10 years on this particular project, working with compounds known as “vascular disrupting agents.” (Click here for an explanation of how they work.) The five-year study funded by the grant will be done in cooperation with University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, one of the top biomedical research institutions in the world.
Though it will be years before any such drugs could hit the market where they would assist cancer patients, Baylor students are already receiving benefits from the work being done here in Waco, working with Pinney and Trawick throughout the research process. The studies have involved not only graduate students and postdoctoral research assistants, but also some undergraduates who have received unique opportunities to be involved so early in their academic careers. (Click here for more on the importance of research at the undergraduate level.)
Sic ’em, Dr. Pinney, Dr. Trawick and all our Baylor researchers!
