DEVELOPMENTAL FUNDS: SUMMARY The Hollings Cancer Center (HCC) at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) utilizes the Cancer Center Support Grant (CCSG) developmental funds to fuel its strategic plans for the advancement of early- stage investigators, team science, translational and clinical research, and support of strategic faculty recruitments. During the current project period, a total of $927k of CCSG developmental funds were distributed for pilot research funding in support of 22 projects. Including the CCSG funds, HCC invested a total of $3.4M in pilot research funds awarded between 2018-2022, which can be directly linked to the successful award of $46.3M million in extramural, multi-year grant funding. This is a 13-fold return on investment. In addition, CCSG developmental funds supported the recruitment of seven new faculty recruits supporting the expansion of scientific expertise in the Cancer Control (CC), Cancer Biology and Immunology (CBI), and Developmental Cancer Therapeutics (DCT), Research Programs. Jezabel Rodriguez-Blanco, PhD (DCT), was recruited in 2020 following her postdoctoral studies at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. Her interests focus on diseases that result from minimal misbalances in the brain and identifying therapeutic strategies to correct them. Michael Marrone, PhD, MPH (CC), joined in 2021 after his postdoctoral fellowship in epidemiology from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. A translational epidemiologist, his goal is to apply epidemiologic methods at the intersection of population science and basic science to improve the translation of cancer biomarkers into population health impact. Thibaut Barnoud, PhD (CBI), was recruited from the Wistar Institute in 2021. His lab examines the effect of p53 variants on cancer risk and response to therapy and the role of heat shock proteins (HSPs) on the initiation and progression of cancer. Aguirre de Cubas, PhD (CBI), was recruited in 2021 from Vanderbilt University Medical Center for his expertise in molecular determinants of immunogenicity, Kalyani Sonawane, PhD (CC), joined HCC in 2022 from the University of Texas School of Public Health and brings a wealth of expertise in clinical analytics and decision science. Casey Langdon, PhD (CBI), was hired in 2022 from St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital for his expertise in genomic changes, such as those observed in rhabdomyosarcoma that mechanistically alter tumor maintenance and identity. Saverio Gentile, PhD (DCT), was recruited in 2022 from the University of Illinois, Chicago. His lab focuses on the role of ion channels in cancer biology. In the next project period, HCC requests $200k per year in developmental funds. These funds will be utilized to meet the following specific aims: 1) Award pilot research funding to HCC investigators to promote team science, high-risk/high-reward ideas, and pre-clinical and clinical concepts; 2) Invest in new faculty start-up packages in sup...