2023 Archives - Page 8 of 8

Funded by the Dick Vitale Pediatric Cancer Research Fund in partnership with Mat Ishbia and Justin Ishbia

Years of cancer research have shown that combining therapies that work differently virtually always works better than when therapies are used alone. New medications are being discovered that change the way that genes are turned on and off. At this same time, treatments are also being developed that use the body’s own immune cells to find and attack cancers. Both of these treatments have been shown to work alone on specific cancers. But each have known limits. We are asking whether combining these treatments will result in a new approach to fight two aggressive cancers: Ewing sarcoma and osteosarcoma. We predict that combining these treatments will result in an effective and well tolerated therapy.

Funded by the Dick Vitale Pediatric Cancer Research Fund in partnership with Mat Ishbia and Justin Ishbia

Childhood cancer remains the leading cause of death from disease in children in high-income countries. Our lab has used cutting-edge technologies to hunt for new drug targets in high-risk pediatric cancers. In neuroblastoma, a common pediatric solid tumor, we discovered a new potential therapeutic target. Drugs have been developed against this target, but they have not been tested in neuroblastoma. In this proposal, we will perform the critical testing of these drugs in high-risk neuroblastoma models in the lab. We will also determine why neuroblastoma cells depend on this target for survival. It is our long-term goal to develop clinical trials testing these drugs in children with high-risk neuroblastoma.