Founded in 1999, the Colorectal Cancer Alliance is the leading nonprofit organization dedicated to ending colorectal cancer within our lifetime. It honors the memory of Christine Sapienza and supports affected families through investments in research—totaling nearly $10 million, including nearly $3 million in early-stage grants to innovative researchers.
Project Cure CRC, by the Colorectal Cancer Alliance, seeks proposals for preclinical and clinical translational research with the potential to dramatically affect colorectal cancer's diagnosis, treatment, or survivorship. It aims to advance colorectal cancer into a curative science, prioritizing High-Risk/High-Reward projects that move new therapies from bench to bedside rapidly. The grant encourages collaborative and public-private partnerships, covering various award categories for academic and industry researchers, with a significant investment planned for research and infrastructure arising from the Request for Proposals (RFP). Research areas include novel strategies in immunotherapy and cellular therapy, improving outcomes and early detection through ctDNA and other liquid biopsies, making clinical trials more effective using emerging technologies, developing therapies for CRC recurrence prevention, applying AI for precision medicine, targeting cell signaling pathways, developing theranostic molecules, and expanding therapies in Oligometastatic Disease. The Senior Investigator Award, a part of this initiative, offers up to $2,000,000 over two years for transformative ideas that accelerate the translation of new therapies and technologies, with a focus on collaboration.