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Research

Each year, approximately 1000 children in Australia and New Zealand, aged 0–14 years, are diagnosed with cancer. Despite paediatric cancer accounting for less than 1% of all cancer cases, the impact on their families and communities is profound and disproportionate.

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One of the researchers who helped crack the code of 10-year-old Northam girl Charlotte Patterson’s incredibly rare disease has received State Government funding that will allow her to use the same methods to rapidly assess the cases of hundreds more patients living with undiagnosed disease.

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One of WA’s biggest ever philanthropic gifts will transform childhood cancer research and treatment by improving outcomes for children with cancer and discovering more effective and less toxic treatments.

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The generous support of Western Australians through Channel 7’s Telethon is helping to fund life-changing child health research, with two The Kids Research Institute Australia researchers awarded significant grants.

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Several The Kids Research Institute Australia researchers will share in more than $7.5 million in prestigious Investigator Grants to pursue a range of innovative child health research.

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Four The Kids Research Institute Australia researchers from a diverse range of fields have been named as finalists for the prestigious 2022 Premier’s Science Awards.

Research

Children with medulloblastoma and ependymoma are treated with a multidisciplinary approach that incorporates surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy; however, overall survival rates for patients with high-risk disease remain unsatisfactory. Data indicate that plant-derived cannabinoids are effective against adult glioblastoma; however, preclinical evidence supporting their use in pediatric brain cancers is lacking. Here we investigated the potential role for Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD) in medulloblastoma and ependymoma. Dose-dependent cytotoxicity of medulloblastoma and ependymoma cells was induced by THC and CBD in vitro, and a synergistic reduction in viability was observed when both drugs were combined.

Research

Cancer vaccination drives the generation of anti-tumor T cell immunity and can be enhanced by the inclusion of effective immune adjuvants such as type I interferons (IFNs). Whilst type I IFNs have been shown to promote cross-priming of T cells, the role of individual subtypes remains unclear. Here we systematically compared the capacity of distinct type I IFN subtypes to enhance T cell responses to a whole-cell vaccination strategy in a pre-clinical murine model.

Research

Congenital intracranial meningiomas are rare lesions. We present a case of congenital intraventricular cystic meningioma, initially characterized with fetal MRI and confirmed postnatally with histopathology. To our knowledge, this is the first in vivo description of a congenital meningioma with fetal MRI. The fetal MRI was able to characterize the lesion as an atypical intraventricular mass which was separate from the choroid plexus, differentiating the mass from a choroid plexus neoplasm.

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The Robert Connor Dawes Foundation has joined forces with the Ethan Davies Fellowship to co-fund a The Kids Research Institute Australia initiative aimed at uncovering new treatments for aggressive childhood brain tumours.