# Signaling and Biotechnology Research Program

> **NIH NIH P30** · WAKE FOREST UNIVERSITY HEALTH SCIENCES · 2024 · $50,162

## Abstract

SIGNALING AND BIOTECHNOLOGY (SBT) PROGRAM: PROJECT SUMMARY
The Signaling and Biotechnology (SBT) Program was newly organized by Wake Forest Baptist Comprehensive
Cancer Center (WFBCCC) leadership in 2018 and integrates basic, translational, and clinical research around
developing novel agents and devices for improving cancer diagnosis and treatment. More explicitly, the SBT
Program aims to dissect key signaling pathways regulating cancer progression and metastasis and to integrate
this knowledge with the development of innovative technologies and therapeutics. The SBT Program comprises
36 cancer-focused investigators representing nine departments from two Schools, the Wake Forest School of
Medicine and the Virginia Tech – Wake Forest University School of Biomedical Engineering and Sciences. The
SBT Program is led by two well-established scientists with distinct research expertise – Rafael Davalos, PhD,
and Yong Lu, PhD; both Program Co-Leaders have distinct, yet complementary expertise. They lead the SBT
Program by guiding its scientific direction to ensure alignment with the cancer burden within the WFBCCC’s
catchment area, catalyzing transdisciplinary collaborations, and promoting career development of junior
investigators. Among many recent reported discoveries and observations, SBT Program members have (1)
developed an innovative technology to label metabolites, resulting in a sensor of lactate and offering a new
revolutionary strategy for targeting cancer and viral infection; (2) designed a new microfluidic platform known as
contactless dielectrophoresis which isolates circulating tumor cells from blood and serves as a marker-free
method to identify tumor initiating cells; (3) invented NanoKnife®, a technology that ablates undesirable tissue
in a non-thermal manner known as irreversible electroporation; this technology has proven to be optimal for
reversing local immunosuppression, activating the innate immune system, and engaging the adaptive immune
system which can improve patient responsiveness to immunotherapeutics; (4) identified a new subset of T cells,
Th9 cells, establishing a new paradigm for T cell-based cancer therapy; and (5) invented TheraBionic P1, a
device that emits low levels of radiofrequency electromagnetic fields for the systemic treatment of advanced
hepatocellular carcinoma. The SBT Program’s total peer-reviewed, direct funding base is $5.5M. Since 2016,
this highly collaborative group of investigators authored a total of 242 program-related research publications, of
which 72 (30%) were inter-programmatic, 42 (17%) were intra-programmatic, and 168 (69%) represented inter-
institutional collaborations. Just over 17% of these publications involved seminal discoveries and translational
breakthroughs published in top-tier journals such as Cell, Nature Biotechnology, Cancer Cell, Nature
Immunology, Nature Cell Biology, Biomaterials, Molecular Cell, Nature Communications, and Advanced
Science. In 2020, the SBT Program conduct...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10813795
- **Project number:** 5P30CA012197-49
- **Recipient organization:** WAKE FOREST UNIVERSITY HEALTH SCIENCES
- **Principal Investigator:** Boris Pasche
- **Activity code:** P30 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $50,162
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 1997-02-01 → 2027-01-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10813795

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10813795, Signaling and Biotechnology Research Program (5P30CA012197-49). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10813795. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*