Hormel Institute scientist awarded $2 million to study the spread of colorectal cancer cells to the liver

The Hormel Institute’s Ningling Kang, PhD, Associate Professor and leader of the Tumor Microenvironment & Metastasis research section, has received a grant titled “Hepatic Stellate Cell Regulation of Metastatic Growth in the Liver.” The five year, $2 million R01 award was awarded by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Liver metastasis is a process where cancer cells that originated from a different part of the body spread to the liver. This grant will allow Dr. Kang’s research group to investigate how colorectal cancer cells that originated from the colon or rectum grow when they enter the liver. This research could lead to potential strategies to prevent colorectal cancer from spreading into the liver or suppress its growth in the liver.

This project has been continuously funded by the NCI for the last 11 years and this funding will enable Dr. Kang to continue this project for the next five years. It is also the fourth time Dr. Kang has obtained a five year grant from the NCI.