The mission: Bring together 2 separate scientific fields — genomics and immunotherapy — to find cures for many of the most hard-to-treat childhood cancers.
“Lightning in a bottle.” That’s how experts have described this team and its incredibly fast impact. So far, the team has:
Due to the extraordinary success of the team, when the Stand Up to Cancer grant expired, the St. Baldrick’s Foundation opted to keep the work going, with a new name that fits its performance to date: EPICC — Empowering Pediatric Immunotherapies for Childhood Cancer.
These institutions participate in the St. Baldrick’s EPICC Team:
This is big science. They’re asking us to think outside the box, to do things that we can’t do with any of the standard funding mechanisms that are available.
Bring together two scientific areas that had been evolving...
Genomics
the study of genes and their functions
Immunotherapeutics
using the body’s own immune system to attack cancer
The team has achieved tremendous progress in some blood cancers.
Now underway: tackling the even bigger challenge of creating immunotherapies for solid tumors in children — especially brain tumors, including some that no child survives today.
Researchers first use genomics to discover the most strategic targets the immune system should attack, to kill cancer cells and leave healthy cells alone.
Once those targets are discovered, the team develops the weapons the immune system can use to attack them.
To test these new therapies and make them available to kids everywhere, the team conducts clinical trials involving multiple institutions across North America.
Because of this team's unprecedented success, the following charity partners have helped support the St. Baldrick’s EPICC Team, to make progress not only in blood cancers, but also solid tumors:
