Dr. Glenn S. Forbes, CEO of Mayo Clinic Rochester, characterized The Hormel Institute partnership in research as keeping with the Mayo Clinic tradition of collaboration. He quotes one of the founding Mayo brothers, William, who said: “In order that the sick may have the benefit of advancing knowledge, union of forces is necessary.”

“The partnership,” Dr. Forbes said, “underscores the value Mayo Clinic places on partnerships in order to maximize its scientific efforts at a time when the costs and complexity of conducting research are on the rise.”

Mayo Clinic is the first and largest integrated, notfor- profit group practice in the world. Doctors from every specialty work together to care for patients, joined by common systems and a philosophy of “the needs of the patient come first.”

The Hormel Institute shares a long-time collaborative partnership with the Mayo Clinic in conducting medical research.

Investigators at The Hormel Institute and Mayo Clinic are recipients of a Minnesota Partnership for Biotechnology and Medical Genomics grant that involves the development of small molecules that will directly target specific cancer genes or proteins to stop the development and growth of cancer. This project holds cutting edge possibilities for the

treatment of cancers. A second major focus is the development of dietary factors as chemopreventive agents to be tested in human clinical trials in cooperation with Mayo Clinic.

The project, led by The Hormel Institute’s Executive Director Zigang Dong, M.D., Dr. P.H. and Mayo Clinic’s Yuan-Ping Pang, Ph.D. , will use genetic code, high-performance computing, modern chemical synthesis and cancer biology to develop chemicals that can selectively block the function of a cancer-related protein called JNK2. The goal…to yield new chemicals that can be used as research tools to further study the role of JNK2 in cancers and to ultimately develop anti-cancer drugs.

The Hormel Institute’s Dr. Zigang Dong is a Mayo Clinic professor as well as a McKnight Professor of the University of Minnesota.