The Minna Lab is part of the Nancy B. and Jake L. Hamon Center for Therapeutic Oncology Research and the W.A. “Tex” & Deborah Moncrief Jr. Center for Cancer Genetics, which are both directed by John D. Minna, M.D.. It is located on the UT Southwestern North Campus in the Simmons Biomedical Research Building.
Dr. Minna is a Professor of Internal Medicine (Medical Oncology) and Pharmacology, and Co-Director of the Experimental Therapeutics Program for the UT Southwestern Simmons Cancer Center.
As part of the Minna Lab research effort, Dr. Minna is the principal investigator or main co-investigator of several major grants. These include an NCI Special Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) in Lung Cancer (P50), NCI Small Cell Lung Cancer (SCLC) Consortium (U24, Charles Rudin, PI), NCI PDX Development and Trial Center (U54, Jack Roth, PI), NCI Development of ASCL1 and NeuroD1 lineage oncogene targeted therapy for SCLC (U01) and several other multi-investigator or private grants.
Major Focus
The current major areas of focus for the Minna Lab research are:
- Identifying and targeting lung cancer acquired vulnerabilities
- Developing ASCL1 targeted therapy for small cell lung cancer and other neuroendocrine lung cancers
- Identifying molecular predictive biomarkers for available chemotherapy and targeted therapy for lung cancer
- Identifying molecular mechanisms of resistance to available chemotherapy for lung cancer
