Researchers investigating ways to minimize ethnic disparities in cancer rates have a new home at the University of California - Davis, thanks to a $7.6 million endowment from the National Cancer Institute.

The university last month announced it would serve as the national headquarters for the newly created Asian-American Network for Cancer Awareness, Research and Treatment (AANCART).

The five-year project aims to increase cancer awareness and prevention programs among the Asian-American community and to encourage the group to participate in clinical trials. The program also will include training sessions for Asian-American health workers.

This is the largest project ever created to decrease cancer rates in Asian Americans, university officials said.

"AANCART brings together a dream team of cancer researchers, clinicians and community leaders to address these disparities," said Moon S. Chen, Jr., associate director for cancer prevention and control at Davis' Cancer Center and an AANCART investigator.

Chen, who will lead AANCART, was recently tapped by President Bush to serve a six-year term on the National Cancer Advisory Board.

Chen is a part of the reason why Davis landed the program, according to Marc B. Schenker, chairperson of the Davis' department of epidemiology and preventive medicine. "Having this program headquartered at UC Davis is a credit both to Dr. Chen and the institution,' he said.

Overall, Aian Americans have a relatively low risk of cancer, but the group's cancer death rate is climbing faster than any other racial group. In addition, they suffer disproportionately from certain cancers. For example, Asian Americans are three times more likely than whites to die of liver cancer and twice as likely to die of stomach cancer.

"AANCART addresses a population of Americans that has long been overlooked in cancer prevention efforts," Schenker said.

Leaders of Sacramento's Asian-American community concur. The project is a 'godsend,' said K.W. Lee, 74, a Korean-born journalist living in Sacramento.

'The greater Sacramento metropolitan region, home to the traditional Asian settlements of Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Filipino peoples, has undergone a major demographic shift with the rapid growth of Southeast and Southern Asian immigrant communities," said Lee, a liver and stomach cancer survivor. "These fragmented, disparate and emerging new communities, plagued with endemic cancers, cry out for a coordinated, ethnic-specific, grassroots intervention program like AANCART.'