New Fellowship award – Dr Jake Shortt

We are delighted to report that Dr Jake Shortt (pictured second from left with Snowdome CEO, Miriam Dexter, the Hon. David Davis and Snowdome Director, Nicky Long) has been awarded the Eva and Les Erdi / Snowdome Foundation Fellowship for New Targets in Haematological Malignancies.

The announcement was made recently at a Victorian Cancer Agency Awards evening hosted by the Victorian Minister for Health, David Davis. This fellowship provides up to $800,000 over four years and is the result of Snowdome’s targeted fundraising approach in identifying unique research opportunities for government and philanthropy to work together.

Dr Shortt will be studying a new drug class that switches normal genes back on in cancer cells. The causal effect is to activate the immune system to fight the cancer. The project will include laboratory experiments evaluating patient samples from a world first human clinical trial. During this trial, Dr Shortt will monitor the drug’s effect on the immune system and help predict which patients will benefit most. Dr Shortt’s research was recently featured in Cell Reports. Dr Shortt is profiled in the Researchers Insight feature below.

With great thanks to Eva & Les Erdi and together with the Victorian Cancer Agency, the Snowdome Foundation is delighted to support Dr Shortt’s project and looks forward to following his progress.