Stand Up for Science launches weekly Substack series on the long road to medical breakthroughs

Stand Up for Science today launched a 12-part weekly Substack series, “Traces Thursday,” aimed at showing how long it can take basic science to become a treatment. The debut installment focuses on oncogenes and Ras, underscoring the group’s case for sustained biomedical research funding.

Why it matters: - Stand Up for Science is using the series to argue that medical breakthroughs often depend on decades of basic research before patients see results. - The group is framing the series as a case for sustained funding for biomedical science at a time when federal research support remains a flashpoint.

What happened: - Stand Up for Science published the first installment of a 12-part series on its Science Fight Club Substack on Aug. 27, 2026. - The weekly series, called “Traces Thursday,” is written by Dr. Jeremy Berg, the former director of the National Institute of General Medical Sciences at NIH and former editor-in-chief of Science magazine. - Berg now serves on Stand Up for Science’s Board of Advisors. - The series examines how major drugs and treatments were developed and why the path from discovery to cure is often slow.

The details: - The inaugural post focuses on oncogenes, described as a century-long science story. - The post traces the cancer-causing mechanism to an observation in a chicken in 1910. - The case study centers on Ras, identified in the 1980s as the first human oncogene. - Ras did not lead to a trial-proven cancer drug until 2023. - The FDA approved the first Ras inhibitor for pancreatic cancer yesterday. - Berg said the historical cases show how breakthroughs often come from combining separate discoveries and then navigating a difficult road to implementation. - Berg said policy makers and the public can learn from these short histories. - Stand Up for Science said landmark therapies in the series depended on long-term research funding.

Between the lines: - The series pairs history with policy messaging, turning scientific timelines into an argument against short-term thinking in research budgets. - By highlighting how long it took for Ras-targeted treatment to reach patients, the project points to the gap between basic discovery and usable medicine. - The timing of the launch, alongside the new FDA approval, gives the series an immediate real-world example to anchor its message.

What's next: - Stand Up for Science plans to publish new “Traces Thursday” posts each Thursday for the next 11 weeks. - Berg is available for comment. - The organization is promoting the series through its Science Fight Club Substack and social channels, including LinkedIn, Bluesky, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok and Reddit.

The bottom line: - The series is designed to turn medical history into a public argument for keeping basic science funded, even when the payoff takes decades.