December 13-15, 2009
Omni San Diego Hotel
San Diego, California
CHAIRPERSONS:
Lynda Chin, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA
Webster K. Cavenee, Ludwig Institute, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA
Paul S. Mischel, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Los Angeles, CA
Mitchel S. Berger, University of California, San Francisco, CA
Molecularly targeted therapies promise to transform the treatment of cancer patients, including those with brain tumors. A deeper understanding of the biology of brain tumors has led to a palpable excitement that new and more effective treatments are on the horizon for these deadly diseases. The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) project, by providing in-depth molecular characterization of these tumors, has begun to shed light on the molecular circuitry of disease. Yet, it is only the beginning. Elucidating the molecular circuitry of brain tumors, modeling it, targeting it in patients in well-designed clinical trials, and finding new ways to non-invasively monitor it, are all essential for translating our increasing knowledge of this disease into improved outcome for patients. What are the functional implications of the spectrum of mutations observed? How do they activate key signaling networks and what molecular selection events will reshape these networks as patients are treated with signal transduction inhibitors and immunotherapies in clinical trials? How can we learn from development? How do we model it in such a way as to further elucidate the underlying biology and provide more appropriate pre-clinical models? How do we interface our emerging map of the molecular circuitry of disease with high-throughput screening efforts to identify new drug (and even siRNA) targets? How do we image disease burden and response to therapy? This conference will bring the basic, genomic, and translational scientists together with the clinicians to discuss how to develop more effective molecularly targeted therapies for brain tumor patients based on a mechanistic understanding of the molecular circuitry of the disease.
Over 300 researchers from 20 different countries participated in this AACR Special Conference. The program featured sessions on pediatric brain tumors, adult brain tumors, modeling tumors in vivo, genomics and genetics of brain cancers, and two sessions on translational neuro-oncology. The conference opened with a keynote session on defining clinical problems and also included a special point-counterpoint session as well as an update on the TCGA. In addition to these plenary sessions, over 130 abstracts were presented in poster sessions.
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Please visit the AACR Meetings & Workshops Calendar for a complete list of upcoming programs.