The Jane Coffin Childs Memorial Fund for Medical Research (the "JCC"), established in 1937, awards the "Jane Coffin Childs Postdoctoral Fellowship" for research in the medical and related sciences bearing on

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

History

The Fund was founded on June 11, 1937, by Starling Winston Childs and Alice S. Childs, in memory of Jane Coffin Childs. Its funds have been on the order of $3 million.

Description

Currently, the Foundation awards 20 to 30 fellowships per year. The fellowship is regarded as one of the most prestigious fellowships in the US, and postdoctoral candidates are awarded with a three-year support. The researchers and the research labs where the fellows conduct their projects have made major scientific contributions in areas such as the advancement of understanding the

human genome The human genome is a complete set of nucleic acid sequences for humans, encoded as DNA within the 23 chromosome pairs in cell nuclei and in a small DNA molecule found within individual mitochondria. These are usually treated separately as the n ...

, and the application of genetic approaches to understanding pathway regulation, and

stem cell In multicellular organisms, stem cells are undifferentiated or partially differentiated cells that can differentiate into various types of cells and proliferate indefinitely to produce more of the same stem cell. They are the earliest type o ...

activation. There are nearly two dozen individuals associated with the Fund—as grantees, fellows, and advisers—have won

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...

s in

physiology Physiology (; ) is the scientific study of functions and mechanisms in a living system. As a sub-discipline of biology, physiology focuses on how organisms, organ systems, individual organs, cells, and biomolecules carry out the chemical ...

medicine Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pract ...

, and

chemistry Chemistry is the science, scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the Chemical element, elements that make up matter to the chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions ...

. Over the years, the Fund has attracted distinguished scientists for its Board of Scientific Advisers. As of 2020, 17 of the former Board members have earned the Nobel Prize. Members of the Board of Scientific Advisers have included: * Ali Shilatifard *

Elizabeth Blackburn Elizabeth Helen Blackburn, (born 26 November 1948) is an Australian-American Nobel laureate who is the former president of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. Previously she was a biological researcher at the University of California, S ...

Peter Cresswell Peter Cresswell FRS is a British immunologist, and Eugene Higgins Professor of Immunobiology and Professor of Cell Biology and of Dermatology, at Yale School of Medicine. His lab primary focuses on the molecular mechanisms of antigen processing ...

Elaine Fuchs Elaine V. Fuchs is an American cell biologist famous for her work on the biology and molecular mechanisms of mammalian skin and skin diseases, who helped lead the modernization of dermatology. Fuchs pioneered reverse genetics approaches, which ...

* Tony Hunter * Cynthia Kenyon * John Kuriyan * Susan McConnell * Thomas D. Pollard *

Randy Schekman Randy Wayne Schekman (born December 30, 1948) is an American cell biologist at the University of California, Berkeley, former editor-in-chief of ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences'' and former editor of ''Annual Review of Cell and ...

* Charles J. Sherr * Pamela A. Silver * Graham C. Walker The Jane Coffin Childs Memorial Fund for Medical Research is dedicated to providing financial support to offer highly qualified scientists the opportunity to pursue research into the causes and origins of cancer. The goal of the Fund is to provide support to the brightest individual scientists pursuing careers in cancer research while promoting and emphasizing the value and contribution of the individual in keeping with the spirit of the conception of the Fund. Notable fellows have included: *

Jeremy M. Berg Jeremy Mark Berg was founding director of the University of Pittsburgh Institute for Personalized Medicine. He holds positions as Associate Senior Vice Chancellor for Science Strategy and Planning and Professor of Computational and Systems Biology ...

* David S. Cafiso *

Margaret T. Fuller Margaret "Minx" T. Fuller is an American developmental biologist known for her research on the male germ line and defining the role of the stem cell environment (the hub cells that establish the niche of particular cells) in specifying cell fat ...

Juan E. González Dr. Juan E. González born in The Bronx, New York is a Professor of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology and Associate Dean for Graduate Studies at The University of Texas at Dallas. González received his Ph.D. from the University of California ...

* Susan Gottesman * Enoch Huang *

Liqun Luo Liqun Luo (; born January 1966) is a neuroscientist in the Department of Biology at Stanford University, where he is the Ann and Bill Swindells Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences, and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical ...

Lara Mahal Lara K. Mahal is an American chemist who is the Canada Excellence Research Chair in Glycomics at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. She is also a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Alberta. She is notable both for h ...

William McGinnis William McGinnis, Ph.Dis a molecular biology, molecular biologist and professor of biology at the University of California San Diego. At UC San Diego he has also served as the Chairman of the Department of Biology from July 1998 - June 1999, as ...

* Jessica Polka * James A. Shapiro *

Joan A. Steitz Joan Elaine Argetsinger Steitz (born January 26, 1941) is Sterling Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale University and Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. She is known for her discoveries involving RNA, inc ...

* Clare M. Waterman-Storer

Notes

External links

The official JCC site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Childs, Jane Coffin Biomedical research foundations 1937 establishments Fellowships Medical and health foundations in the United States

History

Description

See also

Notes

External links