New on NCI’s Website for July 2023 – Researcher/Trainee Special Edition
, by Daryl McGrath
NCI’s collection of cancer information products is constantly growing, so periodically we provide updates on new and updated content of interest to the cancer community. This post in the series features resources of interest to cancer researchers and trainees.
Inside Cancer Careers Podcast: Caring for the Whole Person with Wisdom and Focus
A recent episode of NCI's Center for Cancer Training's Inside Cancer Careers podcast series features a conversation with Otis Brawley, M.D., Bloomberg Distinguished Professor and professor of oncology at Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Brawley shares his career journey into science and his thoughts on the future of cancer research, cancer health disparities, and more.
Also, be sure to check out the latest episode.
Exercise and Nutrition Interventions to Improve Cancer Treatment-related Outcomes (ENICTO) in Cancer Survivors
Numerous studies have found that regular exercise and a healthy diet help cancer survivors live longer and healthier lives. However, there is limited evidence about the effects of exercise and nutrition on survivors undergoing cancer treatment. The Exercise and Nutrition Interventions to Improve Cancer Treatment-related Outcomes (ENICTO) in Cancer Survivors consortium is intended to fill this research gap.
New Versions of the Healthy Eating Index
Two new versions of the Healthy Eating Index (HEI) were released on June 12: HEI-2020 and HEI-Toddlers-2020. The HEI is a research tool to determine overall diet quality as well as the quality of several dietary components. As a measure of diet quality, independent of quantity, the HEI can be used to assess how well people are meeting the US Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Since 2005, researchers from NCI and the US Department of Agriculture have collaborated to update the HEI based on updates to the dietary guidelines.
Health Disparities and Health Equity Resources
The Behavioral Research Program, part of NCI’s Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS), offers important resources for researchers focused on eliminating cancer disparities. The Health Disparities and Health Equity page highlights the program’s areas of research emphasis, available funding opportunities, and ongoing grants.
New HINTS Brief, Public Use Data
The Health Information National Trends Survey (HINTS) routinely collects nationally representative data about the American public's use of cancer-related information and shares that data with researchers. The most recent HINTS Brief examines knowledge and perceptions of palliative care among cancer survivors in the United States. The latest release of HINTS public use data, HINTS 6 (2022), is also available for download.
Bottom Line Blog: NCI’s Sustained Funding and Engagement for Early-Career Cancer Researchers
NCI’s Center for Cancer Training leads the institute’s commitment to training the next generation of cancer researchers. In this NCI Bottom Line Blog post, the center's director, Oliver Bogler, Ph.D., describes trends in NCI’s investment in cancer training over the past 5 years and highlights a few of the ways the center engages with early-career cancer researchers.
Tips to Advance Your Data Science Career
NCI’s Cancer Data Science Pulse blog, produced by the Center for Biomedical Informatics and Information Technology (CBIIT), spoke to data scientists of all experience levels to collect and share career advice.
In one blog post, CBIIT’s Daoud Meerzaman, Ph.D., talks about what he is looking for when interviewing a candidate for a cancer data scientist job. In another, Kun Wang, Ph.D., an early-career cancer data scientist at NCI, shares five things he’s discovered since receiving his doctorate. And Umit Topaloglu, Ph.D., discusses the value data science brings to supporting the cancer research community.
Cancer Data Service Portal
NCI’s Cancer Data Service, part of the Cancer Research Data Commons, has developed a new tool to give cancer researchers expanded capacity and flexibility when using the NCI data ecosystem. The tool provides researchers with access to data storage and sharing capabilities for NCI-funded studies with data that do not match an existing data commons collection or that do not fit current data type criteria and/or the minimum metadata standards for a collection.
New Page for the CIMAC–CIDC Network
NCI’s Division of Cancer Treatment and Diagnosis (DCTD) recently launched a new page for its Cancer Immune Monitoring and Analysis Centers and Cancer Immunologic Data Center Network. The network collects and analyzes tumor samples from people participating in immunotherapy clinical trials to identify biomarkers of response, resistance, and toxicity through comprehensive immune profiling.
Access Resources from the Developmental Therapeutics Program
NCI’s Developmental Therapeutics Program, part of DCTD, provides grants, services, and resources to extramural cancer researchers working to discover and develop new cancer treatments. A new web page highlights these resources and provides contact information for researchers to request access.