海角直播

Research could herald new treatments for childhood cancer

Ground-breaking research led by staff at 海角直播 could lead to new approaches in treating aggressive childhood cancers more effectively.

Academics based at the University鈥檚 National Horizons Centre have been studying the genetics of aggressive lymphoma and have discovered a link between a specific gene and the survival rate of children with the disease. In a paper published in leading scientific journal , the team, led by Professor Vikki Rand and driven by Dr Alex Newman, demonstrated that mutations on the TP53 gene on chromosome 17 is linked to an inferior survival rate of children with aggressive B-cell lymphoma.

As an important genomic marker of poor prognosis the research has made it possible to highlight patients who are less likely to be cured with current therapies.

As part of the study, Dr Newman, alongside Dr Peixun Zhou, Dr Masood Zaka and Ms Alex Blain, generated a cohort made up of patients from across the UK, collected with support from the . Using state-of-the-art sequencing analysis, the team identified a subset of patients that would benefit from treatment reduction to reduce the toxic side effects of chemotherapy, while maintaining a high chance of survival.

The team identified that TP53 mutations were associated with a worse outcome for children with this aggressive lymphoma. Patients without these mutations enjoyed excellent survival rates, despite not receiving immunotherapy which is now given to all patients regardless of their risk group.

Professor Vikki Rand, Director of Biosciences Research in 海角直播鈥檚 School of Health & Life Sciences and the National Horizons Centre (NHC), said: 鈥淏eing able to identify which patients are more likely to respond to specific treatments and those which could suffer adverse reactions is absolutely vital to effective treatment of cancer.

鈥淭his research has successfully demonstrated how mutations on a specific gene can impact the survival rate of children.

鈥淲e now hope that this research can eventually be used to enable clinicians to tailor their treatments to ensure that children affected by this disease can maximise their chances of recovery.鈥�

The National Horizons Centre is based at Darlington鈥檚 Central Park and is a National Centre of Excellence for the bioscience sector bringing together industry, academia and world-class facilities to deliver research, training and partnerships to deliver real-world impact.

Dr Alex Newman, Scientific Experimental Officer in Genomics at the National Horizons Centre, said: 鈥淭he next step is to validate these findings in an international clinical trial. At the NHC we are using our cutting-edge facilities to develop a test to be used in a trial to screen for TP53 abnormalities and investigate how these alterations are driving relapsed disease.鈥�

Dr Jen Vanderhoven, Director of the National Horizons Centre said: 鈥淭his research truly embodies the National Horizons Centre鈥檚 mission statement of discovering diseases earlier, developing novel treatments and delivering life-saving medicines quicker, safer and more affordably.

鈥淭he work of Professor Rand and her team is destined to have huge impact on how we treat lymphoma in children.鈥�

Rachel Kahn, Research Communications Manager at Blood Cancer UK, said: 鈥淲hile survival for many childhood blood cancers has improved substantially, there鈥檚 still more to be done until we see a day when all children survive the disease.

鈥淭his research is an excellent example of how we might be able to do this.

鈥淲e look forward to further research which will look at how useful this mutation will be at predicting how aggressive a child鈥檚 disease will be, but we hope that it will help to identify those who need additional treatment and those who can be spared treatment, to give every child the best possible chance of survival.鈥�

Professor Rand鈥檚 research was supported by Blood Cancer UK, Little Princess Trust, the North East Promenaders Against Cancer (NEPAC), the Hannah Bloom Charitable Trust and the JGW Patterson Foundation.

An insight from Professor Rand for this work is available via the Nature Cancer Community 鈥溾�� blogs talking about the power of a retrospective cohort and collaboration.