Multiple Myeloma Program

The Lipper Center and LeBow Institute for Myeloma Therapeutics encompasses a large, international team of laboratory-based and clinical investigators who are striving to find more effective therapies for multiple myeloma and, someday, a cure. At any given time, dozens of studies and clinical trials for multiple myeloma are underway.

Our program is a founding institution of the Multiple Myeloma Research Consortium (MMRC), which brings together distinguished researchers and world-renowned academic institutions to speed translation of research to clinical care for myeloma patients.

The center's research in the laboratory and the clinic is focused on several areas. These include investigations of the genetic abnormalities of myeloma cells; studies of the complex signaling that enables myeloma cells to grow and resist both conventional chemotherapy and novel therapy; efforts to unleash the power of the immune system against myeloma, including CAR T-cell therapy; and explorations of the way in which myeloma cells interact with their environment in the bone marrow and outside the marrow compartment. The mission of this research is to identify and validate novel targets in myeloma, so that new therapies aimed at these targets can be developed, leading to improved outcomes and a cure.

The center offers patients access to a wide range of clinical research trials. These include studies aimed at improving the outcomes of patients undergoing high-dose chemotherapy and stem cell transplantation; trials using agents like thalidomide and its immunomodulatory derivatives, proteasome inhibitors, which attempt to kill myeloma cells directly and also make it impossible for them to grow in the marrow "neighborhood;" CAR T-cell therapy, an approach that stimulates the immune system vs myeloma; and early intervention trials to prevent disease progression for patients with MGUS or smoldering multiple myeloma. The center also has clinical research trials evaluating supportive therapies, such as bisphosphonates.