Medulloblastoma is a fast-growing childhood brain tumour. Treatment typically involves surgery to remove as much of the tumour as possible, followed by radiotherapy and chemotherapy. However, these methods do not always work and can cause serious side effects that affect the developing brain.
Some researchers are looking into immunotherapy as a treatment option for people living with a brain tumour. By using a person’s own immune system to target cancer cells, immunotherapy could offer a less toxic solution compared to current treatments.
What is it?
Targeted immunotherapy helps the body’s immune system to recognise and attack cancer cells more precisely. It focusses on specific targets that might be different from healthy cells. Recently, Dr Sorensen’s team have identified two new targets on the surface of medulloblastoma cells.
Their aim is to find out how best to reach these targets using immunotherapy. This technique uses antibodies – molecules produced by the body to recognise and destroy harmful substances. By identifying and characterising the antibodies that can recognise these targets, the team can develop a guided treatment that can piggy-back these antibodies to kill the tumour cells. Dr Sorensen hopes to test the effectiveness of these targeted cancer treatments at killing medulloblastoma cells in pre-clinical models. Long term, they hope to gather enough strong data to support bringing this idea towards clinical trials.
To help accelerate their research, the team plan to edit the genes of medulloblastoma cell lines. By monitoring physical characteristics, like tracking if the cells survive and multiply because of the genetic changes, they can begin to test the function of these targets. As well as this, they are also using a large library of sequences to determine which proteins bind to the specific target proteins the best.
Why is it important?
Despite being the most common paediatric solid brain tumour, medulloblastoma still lacks promising therapeutic approaches.
Immunotherapies have been successfully used to treat childhood blood cancers. However, we are still waiting to see the same success in solid tumours, like medulloblastoma. Furthering research into immunotherapy for brain tumours could lay the groundwork for future effective treatments.
By identifying targets specific to medulloblastoma cells and developing novel targeting strategies, our hope is to dramatically improve the outcomes of medulloblastoma patients and to reduce adverse effects on growing children.
Dr Poul Sorensen
Research is just one other way your regular gift can make a difference
Research is the only way we will discover kinder, more effective treatments and, ultimately, stamp out brain tumours – for good! However, brain tumours are complex and research in to them takes a great deal of time and money.
Across the UK, over 100,000 families are facing the overwhelming diagnosis of a brain tumour and it is only through the generosity of people like you can we continue to help them.
But, by setting up a regular gift – as little as £2 per month – you can ensure that families no longer face this destructive disease.
Dr Poul Sorensen is based at the BC Cancer Research Centre in Canada. He is also a Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at The University of British Colombia. Dr Sorensen’s lab aims to target altered proteins and faulty signalling pathways in childhood brain tumours to help develop better treatments.
