The Prostate Cancer Foundation Announces Recipients of 2005 Competitive Awards
More than $4.2 Million Distributed to Promising Prostate Cancer Research

SANTA MONICA, Calif., — April 4, 2006 -- The Prostate Cancer Foundation (PCF) announced today the recipients of the its 2005 Competitive Awards. The program granted more than $4.2 million to 46 research scientists, 24 of whom were newly-awarded researchers.

The Competitive Awards Program is an innovative venture-style research funding program that provides financial support to high-impact research projects with the greatest potential to improve near-term treatments for men with advanced prostate cancer. The awards are granted to projects in a variety of areas including genomics, proteomics, clinical development, signal transduction and nutrition.

"As the largest non-profit organization focused exclusively on the goal of supporting prostate cancer research and discovery, we are proud of our role in advancing scientific understanding of this disease and identifying new approaches to defeating it," said Leslie D. Michelson, chief executive officer of the Prostate Cancer Foundation. "The PCF continues to be a driving force in the pursuit of better treatments and, eventually, a cure for prostate cancer."

Prostate cancer is the most common non-skin cancer in the United States, striking one in six men. In 2006 alone, more than 234,000 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer and more than 27,000 men will die. Baby boomer men begin turning 60 this year, bringing increasing numbers of men into the highest-risk zone for the disease. As a result, the number of new cases over the next decade is expected to increase to more than 300,000 annually. The PCF continues to harness every resource available to help find better treatments and a cure for prostate cancer.

The Prostate Cancer Foundation 2005 Competitive Awards Program recipients are:

Baylor College of Medicine - Ming Zhang, PhD
Brigham & Women's Hospital - Francesca Demichelis, MSc, PhD; Jing Ma, MD, PhD
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute - Ronald A. DePinho, MD; Levi A. Garraway, MD, PhD
Fred C. Hutchinson Cancer Research Center - Peter S. Nelson, MD
Georgetown University - Edward P. Gelmann, MD
Hebrew University (Israel) - Alexander Levitzki, PhD
Johns Hopkins University - Philip A. Beachy, PhD; Robert H. Getzenberg, PhD; John T. Isaacs, PhD; Dan Stoianovici, PhD
M.D. Anderson Cancer Center - Renata Pasqualini, PhD
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center - James P. Allison, PhD; Neal Rosen, MD, PhD; Howard I. Scher, MD
Ohio State University - Ching-Shih Chen, MD, PhD
Roger Williams Medical Center - Richard P. Junghans, MD, PhD; Qiangzhong Ma, PhD
Stanford University - Calvin J. Kuo, MD, PhD
University of Alabama, Birmingham - Richard D. Lopez, MD
University of California, Davis - Ralph W. de Vere White, MD
University of California, Los Angeles - Owen N. Witte, MD; Lily Wu, MD, PhD
University of California, Riverside - Ameae M. Walker, PhD
University of California, San Francisco - Robert A. Bok, MD, PhD; Marc I. Diamond, MD; Robert J. Fletterick, PhD; Timothy P. Quinn, MD
University of Iowa - Michael D. Henry, PhD
University of Maryland - Yun Qiu, PhD
University of Massachusetts - Robert E. Carraway, PhD
University of Michigan - Arul M. Chinnaiyan, MD, PhD; Russell S. Taichman, DMD, DMSc; Shaomeng Wang, PhD
University of Minnesota - Junxuan Lu, PhD
University of Pittsburgh - Beth R. Pflug, PhD; Uzma S. Shah, PhD 
University of Rochester - Ganesh S. Palapattu, MD
University of Southern California - Gerhard A. Coetzee, PhD
University of Virginia - John M. Chirgwin, PhD; Michael J. Weber, PhD 
University of Wisconsin - Wade Bushman, MD, PhD; George Wilding, MD
Vanderbilt University - Jay H. Fowke, PhD, MPH
Wake Forest University - Purnima Dubey, PhD

Information on each award can be found at www.prostatecancerfoundation.org/2005competitive_awards.

About the Prostate Cancer Foundation
The Prostate Cancer Foundation is the world's largest philanthropic source of support for prostate cancer research. Founded in 1993, the PCF has raised more than $260 million and provided funding for prostate cancer research to more than 1,200 researchers at 100 institutions worldwide. The PCF has a simple, yet urgent goal: to find better treatments and a cure for prostate cancer. For more information, please visit www.prostatecancerfoundation.org.

Sarah Evans
(310) 570-4705
sevans@prostatecancerfoundation.org

Katie Lambe
(310) 570-4713
klambe@prostatecancerfoundation.org