Federal Grant Award Summary

Duke University's Office of Research Administration received a $402,135 Project Grant from the National Cancer Institute under the Cancer Biology Research program (CFDA 93.396) effective May 1, 2026 through April 30, 2029. The award funds development of SCHICAR (Single-Cell Hi-C Integrating Chromatin Accessibility and RNA), a novel single-cell tri-modal platform technology that simultaneously captures three-dimensional (3D) genome interactions, chromatin accessibility, and gene expression profiles from individual cancer cells. This technology addresses critical limitations in existing single-cell genomics methods by achieving approximately 1,000-fold higher throughput, 100-fold lower cost per cell, and 20-fold greater enrichment for long-range enhancer-promoter interactions compared to current approaches.

The research initiative encompasses three specific aims: optimizing the SCHICAR protocol for cancer cell applications, developing robust tissue protocols for primary and metastatic tumors using genetically engineered mouse models, and validating the platform using human primary and relapsed tumor biopsies. By enabling comprehensive tri-modal analysis from identical cells rather than relying on computational inference across separate datasets, SCHICAR is expected to provide ground-truth data that will advance understanding of cancer genome architecture disruptions, structural variations, enhancer hijacking, and epigenetic alterations that drive metastasis, relapse, and therapy resistance. The work will be conducted at Duke University's Durham, North Carolina facility.