A researcher's angel.

There's potential life-saving medical research going on that's way too early for commercialization, and even too risky to make it through the traditional government grant process.

But at least one biologist at Pasadena's California Institute of Technology has received a crucial assist from a retired Silicon Valley venture capitalist who is employing the same level of risk-taking in his philanthropy as he did during his investment career.

Sarkis Mazmanian, a CalTech assistant professor, is receiving $450,000 from Benchmark Capital co-founder Andrew Rachleff to further his research on the relationship between intestinal bacteria and colon cancer. The grant, one of three announced last week, is being administered by the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation.

Mazmanian needs to do more animal studies to test his thesis that the inflammation that can result from an overgrowth of harmful bacteria in the intestine plays a significant role in tumor growth and possibly in its initiation.

"It's very exploratory research of the kind that the National Institutes of Health would never fund these days," said Mazmanian. "This opportunity is almost unique. (Rachleft) was really looking for something very risky, which never would have gotten funded by traditional mechanisms."

Staff reporter Deborah Crowe can be reached at [phone], ext. 232, or at [e-mail]