NMSU Receives Grant to Expand Cancer Research

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New Mexico State University has received a grant to expand minority participation in cancer research. Anna María Pérez-Wright has the story.

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New Mexico State University has received a 1.6-million-dollar grant from the U-S Department of Health and Human Services in partnership with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center of Seattle. Associate professor of animal and range sciences Jim Strickland says the grant is to increase the number of minorities involved and expand N-M-S-U's capacity for cancer research.

"What it tries to do is, is through the partnership, expose more minority students to the cancer research arena with the idea that if they're exposed to it, they will likely have a better chance of getting interested in the area and getting excited about it and then carrying that forward as their plans for the future, either in research or in clinical treatment of the disease."

Strickland, who's helping map out the project, says the five-year grant will also help increase the number of minority participants in research projects.

"There are health disparity issues associated with minority populations. Part of it because we don't know as much about some minority populations, the genetics associated with it, how they basically respond to disease as much as we do the majority in the country. And primarily because there haven't been as many of them as participants of controlled research studies."

The project will partner N-M-S-U professors with researchers from the Seattle cancer research center. Participating students and faculty will have the opportunity to gain experience through an exchange program. For N-M-S-U's College of Agriculture and Home Economics, I'm Anna María Pérez-Wright.