{"entity":{"id":"cancer-center-at-illinois","kind":"institution","name":"Cancer Center at Illinois","aka":["CCIL"],"tldr":"An engineering-led NCI basic cancer centre at the University of Illinois, working on chemical imaging of tissue, new anticancer chemistry and comparative oncology.","summary":"The Cancer Center at Illinois is one of the newest NCI-designated basic laboratory cancer centres and is unusual in being rooted in a college of engineering and a veterinary school rather than a medical centre. Rohit Bhargava's infrared chemical imaging reads tissue chemistry without stains; Paul Hergenrother's laboratory produced the procaspase-3 activator PAC-1 and other compounds that entered trials; Timothy Fan runs comparative oncology trials in pet dogs that inform human drug development. The Carle Illinois College of Medicine, the first engineering-based medical school, is its clinical partner, and computational and AI approaches to cancer are a growing theme.","asOf":"2026-09-09","links":[{"label":"Cancer Center at Illinois","url":"https://cancer.illinois.edu"},{"label":"University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign","url":"https://illinois.edu"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"cancers":[],"sections":["drug-discovery","ai-computation"],"technologies":["optical-imaging","ai-drug-design"],"targets":[],"drugs":[],"companies":[],"institutions":[],"pathways":[],"terms":[],"trials":[],"people":["rohit-bhargava"],"bottlenecks":["b-preclinical-models","b-translational-valley"],"keyPapers":[],"journals":[],"dependsOn":[],"notes":[],"city":"Urbana, IL","country":"US","lat":40.11,"lng":-88.228,"institutionType":"research-institute","website":"https://cancer.illinois.edu","nci":"basic","university":"University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign","programs":["Chemical imaging of tissue","Anticancer drug discovery","Comparative oncology"]},"route":"/institutions/cancer-center-at-illinois/","neighbours":{"section":[{"id":"ai-computation","kind":"section","name":"AI & Computation","route":"/fronts/ai-computation/"},{"id":"drug-discovery","kind":"section","name":"Drug Discovery Platforms","route":"/fronts/drug-discovery/"}],"technology":[{"id":"ai-drug-design","kind":"technology","name":"AI-driven drug & target discovery","route":"/technologies/ai-drug-design/"},{"id":"optical-imaging","kind":"technology","name":"Optical & fluorescence imaging","route":"/technologies/optical-imaging/"}],"person":[{"id":"rohit-bhargava","kind":"person","name":"Rohit Bhargava","route":"/people/rohit-bhargava/"}],"bottleneck":[{"id":"b-preclinical-models","kind":"bottleneck","name":"Lab models that fail to predict what happens in patients","route":"/bottlenecks/b-preclinical-models/"},{"id":"b-translational-valley","kind":"bottleneck","name":"The valley of death between lab and product","route":"/bottlenecks/b-translational-valley/"}],"institution":[{"id":"nci","kind":"institution","name":"National Cancer Institute (NIH)","route":"/institutions/nci/"}],"collection":[{"id":"nci-cancer-centers","kind":"collection","name":"NCI-Designated Cancer Centers","route":"/collections/nci-cancer-centers/"}]}}