Vancouver researchers are playing a central role in a new international Pediatric Cancer Dream Team. Team members were announced in early April by Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) and the St. Baldrick’s Foundation at the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting. 

The team is receiving $14.5 million in funding over 4 years from the SU2C–St. Baldrick’s Pediatric Dream Team Translational Cancer Research Grant. 

The Vancouver team is led by Dr Poul Sorensen, senior scientist at the BC Cancer Agency Research Centre and scientist at the Child and Family Research Institute at BC Children’s Hospital (BCCH). 

The Vancouver team has discovered a set of proteins that appear to be expressed on the cell surfaces of a type of high-risk childhood sarcomas, and is now working on developing therapeutic antibodies that target these proteins only on cancer cells and not on normal cells. In addition, the group is evaluating cell surface proteins receiv­ed from team collaborators at Baylor College of Medicine, SickKids, Seattle Children’s Research Institute, and the University of Wisconsin. Vancouver researchers at the BC Cancer Agency are performing additional genetic sequencing of selected tumor types to discover new surface markers of childhood cancers. The research project is anticipated to start 1 July, with clinical trials scheduled to open during the first year.

The Vancouver team also includes:

•    Dr Mads Daugaard, young investigator and research associate at BC Cancer Agency Research Centre in the Department of Molecular Oncology. 
•    Dr Marco Marra, director and scientist at the BC Cancer Agency Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre, professor in the UBC De­partment of Medicine Genetics, Canada Research Chair in Genome Science, and adjunct professor in the Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry at Simon Fraser University.
•    Dr Rob Holt, head of sequencing at the BC Cancer Agency Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre, associate professor in the UBC Department of Medical Genetics, and associate professor in the SFU Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry.
•    Dr Kirk Schultz, clinician scientist and head of Childhood Cancer and Blood Research at the Child and Family Research Institute at BCCH, pediatric oncologist at BCCH, and professor in the UBC Department of Pediatrics.