Breakthrough in the fight against childhood cancer

http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/about_us/viewNewsArticle.do?articleId=342

20 Feb 2014

Summary The research team behind the Help Fight Childhood Cancer project has just published a groundbreaking paper. It reveals seven promising drug candidates - identified with the help of World Community Grid members – for neuroblastoma, one of the most common and dangerous forms of childhood cancer.

The Help Fight Childhood Cancer research team at the Chiba Cancer Center in Japan has discovered drug candidates that show great promise as new treatments for neuroblastoma, one of the most common and dangerous forms of childhood cancer. This breakthrough marks one of the most significant scientific discoveries to date for World Community Grid.

Thanks to the contribution of over 200,000 World Community Grid members, the researchers were able to screen three million compounds and identify seven that destroy neuroblastoma tumors in mice without causing any apparent side effects.

The Chiba team plans to partner with a pharmaceutical company for further development, while also expanding their future work on World Community Grid to address other forms of childhood cancer.

In this blog post Dr. Akira Nakagawara, who leads the research team at Chiba, explains the significance of this exciting finding and its potential implications on treatments for other forms of cancer.