Calgary research team working to bring new hope for children and families affected by cancer
Calgary research team working to bring new hope for children and families affected by cancer
Cancer cells have a way of tricking our immune system into thinking they belong in our bodies, so local researchers are working toward new immunotherapies that will function like vaccines in young cancer patients.
The work is being done in a lab that looks like any other at the Cumming School of Medicine, but what makes the difference for Dr. Aru Narendran and his team are the powerful computers they're able to use not only to network with other researchers, but to figure out complex problems.
"If I take all your DNA, which is the genetic material, and stretch, it will be 67 billion miles long, that is 150,000 trips to the moon and back," he said.
"So we have computers and bioinformatics technology to bring in so we can look at all this information to figure out what we need to do."
Narendran is a pediatric cancer researcher and practising pediatric doctor that takes it personally when he can't provide life-saving treatment for young patients.
"We are looking at it from many different angles," he said.
"We are coming up with new drugs, for example, new ways of treatment and also new ways of stimulating the immune system to fight that cancer that is somehow shielding itself from this very effective system called the immune system of our body."
Narendran says childhood cancer is very rare at about 150 children per million who are diagnosed, but children with certain genetic conditions or other risk factors have a higher incidence of cancer.
"It's very hard to tell a parent that, 'I'm sorry, I don't have any treatment for your child,'" he said.
"That is what drives all of us, pretty much. We want to get to a point that we will say, 'You know what, we will take care of your (child).'"
Narendran says what scientists have learned so far is to attack cancer cells from multiple angles with more than one treatment.
In addition to more traditional chemotherapy, radiation and surgery are new-generation treatments being developed in Calgary and other centres all over the world.
"I was a scientist before I went to medical school," said Narendran.
"So that gave me the expertise and exposure to actually see patients, treating them, and to find new cures and treatments so we can tell every child that, 'You'll be okay, we will take care of you.'"
While the research project is not at the clinical trial stage yet, the team needs active cancer cells collected from young patients to run tests.
"I have never had a single parent, especially a mother never told me, 'You cannot have these cells,'" he said.
"We cannot do work (without them). They're always very supportive, even in the darkest days in their lives, they are always very supportive, because they know this will help another child in the future."
Because cancer cells don't survive outside of our bodies, the team uses computers to develop models of them to discover ways of attacking them successfully.
"One of my students took a protein that was causing cancer in a very small number of children and he (replicated) it on the computer to design a drug that would bind and block his activity," Narendran said.
The new Calgary Cancer Centre, set to open in 2023-24, has been designed with the clinical and research operations side by side to help foster the growth of innovation in the space.
"I envision a day where drugs discovered and made in Calgary or in Alberta will be used across the world, to a very large number of patients and children, as well as adults who are affected by cancer," said Narendran.
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