Research Newsletter - September 2026

The 2026 Vera Bradley Foundation Classic raised $1.34 million to support discoveries at the Vera Bradley Foundation Center for Breast Cancer Research at the IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center. This year's Vera Bradley Foundation Classic brought supporters together for two weekends of pickleball, tennis, golf and giving.

With this gift, the foundation’s cumulative contributions to breast cancer research now stand at more than $44 million. Their generosity supports IU breast cancer researchers as they make advances in breast cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Thank you to the Vera Bradley Foundation for its unwavering commitment to advancing breast cancer research.

The cancer center is seeking faculty with a strong background in clinical trials and clinical research to serve as the interim associate director for clinical research at the cancer center. This leadership role is supported at 20% effort. View the position description.

Please note that this is an interim appointment. Following the national search for a new cancer center director, the new director will determine whether the interim appointment transitions to a permanent associate director for clinical research role.

Faculty interested in being considered should submit a brief statement describing their interest in the position and relevant qualifications and current CV. Application materials should be submitted to Trisha Wise-Draper, MD, PhD, (twisedra@iu.edu) no later than Oct. 1.

Cancer InFocus Indiana is an interactive data and mapping tool that brings cancer data and information about the communities where Hoosiers live in one place. Users can explore local patterns, compare communities, create maps and turn complex data into information that can guide action. Cancer InFocus was developed by the University of Kentucky Markey Cancer Center and adapted for Indiana by the IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Cancer InFocus is designed to make cancer center catchment area surveillance more efficient. Its data gathering program, CIFTools, collects publicly available data from multiple sources. The data are linked to geographic information and displayed through an interactive dashboard. Data includes cancer rates; social determinants of health; screening and behavioral risks; and other barriers and risk factors. Explore the new resource.

An opportunity to learn more about updates to this resource will be at the IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center Grand Rounds at 8 a.m. Friday, Oct. 16. Todd Burus, PhD, University of Kentucky, will present “Updates to Cancer InFocus and Future Directions of Population Health Data Science." Learn more and add to your calendar.

Rethink Tobacco Indiana (RTI) is a statewide grant initiative based at the cancer center aimed at creating awareness and promoting health systems change related to treating tobacco use and dependence in behavioral health settings. The cancer center's web team recently worked with RTI to move its web presence within the cancer center's website. Explore the Rethink Tobacco Indiana webpages.

The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) recently unveiled the AACR Cancer Progress Report 2026. This milestone report provides the latest statistics on cancer incidence, mortality, and survivorship, while highlighting groundbreaking advances of the past year, and the lifesaving impact of federal investments in cancer research. View the report.

Elizabeth Yeh, PhD, has been named co-leader of the Experimental and Developmental Therapeutics (EDT) research program, and Alastair Thompson, MD, will serve as interim co-leader of EDT.

A pharmacologist, Yeh focuses her research on protein kinase signaling in cancer and the development of experimental therapeutics. Yeh succeeds Huda Salman, MD, PhD. Thompson has spent more than four decades dedicating his career to advancing breast cancer care by turning scientific discoveries into more personalized approaches to prevention, diagnosis, treatment and survivorship. Thompson succeeds Mateusz Opyrchal, MD, PhD.

NRG Oncology (NRG) solicits applications for committee membership on a yearly basis. Applicants may apply to a maximum of one choice in each of the three committee types: Disease Specific, Non-Disease Specific and Scientific Core. Applicants to the Core Committee will also be considered for membership in the General Committee. General Committee members are considered for appointments to working groups within their disease site.

If you are already listed as a committee member on the NRG website, there is no need to apply again for the same committee unless your term is expiring (fall 2023 or before). The application deadline is midnight ET Oct. 25.

Learn more and apply.