For cancer researchers in Colorado, President Obama's call to cure the confounding disease in our lifetime was similar to President Kennedy's challenge to put a man on the moon.

It was bold and caught some by surprise.

Tim Byers, interim director of the University of Colorado Cancer Center, said Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress Tuesday night was supposed to largely focus on the economy. Byers said he was pleased to see the president bring cancer up.

"The fact that he threw in other big ideas and challenges was surprising," Byers said. "But I like the idea that during a crisis, we can think of new things and big challenges."

Obama made the statement a little more than midway through his speech. Leading up to it, he talked about health care reform and cited some of the items that could lead to a reduction in skyrocketing health care costs.

Then came the cancer line.

"It will launch a new effort to conquer a disease that has touched the life of nearly every American, including me, by seeking a cure for cancer in our time," said Obama, whose mother died of cancer.

But Dr. Nicholas DiBella, chairman of the board for the Colorado Cancer Research Program, said it's not just cancer for which a cure must be found. He said there are many kinds of cancer - some of which research has made great strides against.

DiBella said the test of whether Obama is serious will be if federal funding for the National Cancer Institute is increased instead of cut during his term.

"Our own organization depends on federal grants," he said. "From year to year, we have been fearful that our budget would be cut and we'd have to close down offices. But if he increased funding, that would be a major sign he was serious."

Byers, whose center received $110 million for cancer research last year, agreed and said an increase of funding could be a stimulus package for the cancer research industry as a whole.

Byers and DiBella believe the cancer challenge Obama issued is realistic, and Byers noted progress in research in the last decade alone has been "astounding."