Fall 2025
By Caitlin Henault
Photography by David Fox Photographer
Basic research and discovery science often power the greatest breakthroughs in cancer research, paving the way for enhanced treatments, improved patient outcomes, and renewed hope for individuals with cancer and their families. For Russ Agrusa, this concept drives his visionary commitment to supporting innovative research initiatives at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
“Electricity was discovered 400 years before we had computer chips and iPhones,” said Russ. “Progress can seem slow when we’re dealing with what is very complex biology—we’re still in the discovery phase. That’s why cancer research is so important: you can’t treat something if you don’t understand how it works.”
Russ and his late wife, Paula, established the Project P Fund in 2014 with a goal of empowering researchers at Dana-Farber to develop more effective targeted and immune-based therapies for patients with colorectal cancer. Since Paula’s death in 2016, Russ has continued to honor her legacy through ongoing support for the Project P Fund. With a generous new gift of $2 million, Russ will provide critical funding for projects designed to transform immune-based therapies, enhance precision medicine, and advance prevention, early detection, and interception of the disease.
“Funding from the Project P Fund will help us deliver promising new immunotherapy approaches that will prolong and improve quality of life for patients, match patients with medicines that target the specific gene alterations driving their tumors, and leverage artificial intelligence to develop new early detection tests and interventions,” said Kimmie Ng, MD, MPH, associate chief of the Division of Gastrointestinal Oncology, director of the Young-Onset Colorectal Cancer Center, and co-director of the Colon and Rectal Cancer Center. Ng leads the Project P team alongside Jeffrey Meyerhardt, MD, MPH, chief clinical research officer, co-director of the Colon and Rectal Cancer Center, and the Douglas Gray Woodruff Chair in Colorectal Cancer Research at Dana-Farber; Marios Giannakis, MD, PhD; and Benjamin Schlechter, MD.
With Paula’s legacy top of mind, Russ believes that these efforts—combined with the power of emerging technologies like artificial intelligence—will bring the power of more personalized immune-based treatments to patients with colorectal cancer.
“My dream is a world where every patient with cancer can receive a personalized treatment that fires up their own immune system to fight their disease,” Russ said. “It may sound like science fiction, but every one of these scientific discoveries adds to the arsenal of knowledge that will bring us closer to that world.”