Dr. Terence Burns, MD, PhD at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester has been awarded the 2021 SBTF Discovery Grant by the American Brain Tumor Association.

His project is titled “Intratumoral Extracellular Metabolomic Biomarkers of IDH-mutant Glioma.”

“IDH-mutant gliomas are the most common gliomas of young adults. Despite initial sensitivity to chemotherapy and radiation, they invariably progress into treatment-resistant and ultimately fatal tumors. Translation of novel therapies for glioma is complicated by the lack of biomarkers that indicate treatment effectiveness. Survival remains the gold standard outcome measure. Clinical trials for patients with IDH-mutant gliomas may require a decade to yield survival results, hampering timely progress in a complex field. When trials fail, as is typically the case, few insights into why the treatment failed are available to guide therapeutic improvements. The cycle is then repeated with new novel candidates leading to a growing list of failed drugs without clear directions for improvement. New tools are urgently needed to accelerate discovery of novel therapies.  Here we propose to evaluate biomarkers from live human IDH-mutant gliomas during surgery, and will compare these to findings from mice carrying human IDH-mutant gliomas. We will also determine if biomarker levels from the live tumor respond to currently available therapies in real time in mice. If so, this work can provide a path forward to more rapidly determine which therapies or combinations are most effective within individual patients.  We are optimistic that this strategy can open a new frontier of rapid individualized feedback which is so urgently needed to cure gliomas.”

– Dr. Terence Burns

You can learn more about the impact your donations have made on brain tumor research as well as read updated on previously awarded Discovery Grants on our Impact page. You can see the ABTA Press Release regarding this Discovery Grant on their News blog.