Our speaker this week will be Steve Grant, PhD, Autonation Cancer Research Institute
Stephen G. Grant, Ph.D. is a geneticist and toxicologist. He is a Professor in the Department of Public Health, Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Osteopathic Medicine at Nova Southeastern University and a Project Director in the NSU AutoNation Breast Cancer Research Institute. Dr. Grant received both his undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Toronto. His Ph.D. thesis work was performed in the Research Institute of the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, where he investigated mechanisms of genetic mutation, a topic he pursues to the present day. He completed a research fellowship in mouse genetics at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo and a clinical fellowship leading to Board Certification at the University of California in San Francisco. Dr. Grant began his career as an independent investigator at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, before spending almost 20 years at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, where he developed a unique blood-based method of exposure monitoring which has been applied to human chemical and radiation exposures due to environmental, occupational, accidental, medical and lifestyle exposures. His work demonstrating the effect of passive maternal exposure to tobacco smoke on unborn babies has been cited in support of many laws limiting smoking the workplace and around children. Dr. Grant’s current work centers on understanding the molecular basis of sporadic breast cancer and the environmental causes of breast cancer. In addition, he is extending insight found in breast cancer to other types of cancer, such as prostrate and leukemia. Dr. Grant teachers at the graduate, undergraduate and professional levels, as well as performing community outreach. He has participated in research projects involving over 14.7 million dollars in funding from local and national foundations and the federal government, using these resources to train high school students and teachers, undergraduates, graduate students, postdoctoral and medical fellows. His work has generated almost 300 abstracts and presentations, over 100 scientific publications and 2 books. As an expert in cancer, he regularly reviews grant proposals for the federal government and foundations, manuscripts submitted to more than 30 peer-reviewed journals, including JAMA, JNCI, PNAS, and PLoS One, and published articles for the clinical McMaster Online Rating of Evidence.