CAREER ENHANCEMENT PROGRAM: ABSTRACT The primary objective of the Career Enhancement Program (CEP) of the UNC Pancreas SPORE is to augment the career development of a diverse group of faculty members who will focus on pancreatic cancer research. This will be accomplished by 1) providing financial support to develop and enhance the research effort of these faculty and 2) to provide both clinical and laboratory mentoring for investigators who are new to the field. We intend to foster the research careers of translational investigators working in pancreatic cancer. The CEP will select investigators for support from the entire spectrum of translational research in pancreatic cancer; including those working in public health areas of prevention and early detection, diagnosis and other pertinent areas of population science; basic science investigators working to translate their findings to patient care in the clinic and translational/clinical investigators working to improve the outcome for patients with pancreatic cancer. We will support highly qualified investigators who are new to the field of pancreatic cancer with a focus on early career or mid-career investigators transitioning to work in this area. The CEP is led by Jonathan Serody MD Associate Director for Translational Science at the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and Elizabeth Thomas Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology. The co-leaders are supported by the CEP Advisory Committee (CEPAC) that is chaired by the co-leaders and includes Melissa Troester, PhD (Population Sciences), Anne Menkens, PhD (Administration), Antonio Baines PhD (CEP Minority Advisor, NCCU), Albert Baldwin, PhD (Director DRP), and Andrea Hayes-Jordan (Pediatric Surgery) and our patient advocates. Applicants will be selected from the highly qualified pool of investigators at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and North Carolina Central University an Historic Black College and University in Durham NC which has a strong scientific relationship with the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and has a large African American and Latino population of students and postdoctoral fellows. Recruitment of underrepresented minorities, disabled individuals, and women to pancreatic research will be emphasized and will be the focus of Dr. Baines’s efforts on the CEPAC. Financial support will be for an initial period of one year, that will be renewable if there has been appropriate translational progress. We will collaborate with our partner institutions to strengthen multi-institutional collaborations as the CEP matures.