No child with leukemia

Acute B lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL) is the most common cancer in children under 18 years of age. Cure rates in pediatric leukemias for children over 2 years of age have greatly improved in recent years. However, childish leukemias are still considered a separate entity with a frightening diagnosis (5-year survival <20%). Childhood ALL-B has, beyond the emotional damage to families, dire consequences on the development of the child due to the multi-organ toxicity of current treatments.

The group of Dr. Pablo Menéndez from the Josep Carreras Foundation is an international leader in childhood B-ALL and has spent 20 years studying the origin of leukemia in the womb, the causes (etiology) and the mechanisms of the disease (pathogenesis). For 4 years, and motivated by the exclusion by the pharmaceutical industry of including children under one year of age in immunotherapies with T lymphocytes (CAR-T therapy), the group also investigates targeted and non-toxic immunotherapies for these children, in order to avoid the life-long consequences of survivors of current chemo therapy.

Activities

• Generate a laboratory model that reproduces the disease in order to study how and why this type of leukemia develops.
• Identify mechanisms that alter gene expression without mutating the DNA structure through the epigenetic study of these sick children.

Who will benefit?

Children under 2 years of age with a “denovo” diagnosis of acute leukemia, survivors of the disease at risk of relapses and future patients, given the higher prevalence in increasingly developed societies.