Cultivating cells from a rare brain cancer that attacks infants and children may increase the chances of finding a treatment, says a team of Calgary researchers.

The team, based at the University of Calgary and the Tom Baker Cancer Centre, developed a way to grow atypical teratoid/rhaboid tumours (AT/RT) in a petri dish, which had proven to be difficult.

"It's a very rare, rare tumour, and it has been a problem growing them outside the body. For some unknown reason, they do not grow outside the body," explained Dr. Aru Narendran on Wednesday.

'Nothing that we do today is going to help the children that are diagnosed yesterday or today. But this is definitely for the children that are diagnosed tomorrow.'—Christine Wandzura, Kids Cancer Care Foundation of Alberta

The researchers added a small amount of brain fluid from an infant suffering from AT/RT to successfully grow the cells in a petri dish. Their findings were published in the July 24 edition of the Journal of Neuro-Oncology.

"To do (drug) tests we need to have cancer cells in cultures," said Narendran. "We take the cancer cells, add the targeted therapy (drug) agent and show whether it can kill or not kill."

AT/RT is a rare and aggressive form of brain cancer that affects infants and young children. Although only about a dozen cases are diagnosed in Canada every year, fewer than 10 per cent of children under three who get it survive.

The research was funded by the Brain Tumour Research Foundation of Canada and the Kids Cancer Care Foundation of Alberta, which was started by Christine Wandzura who lost her son to a brain tumour in 1991.

"As a mother that's lost her child to a brain tumour, I think that it's very bittersweet," she said. "Nothing that we do today is going to help the children that are diagnosed yesterday or today. But this is definitely for the children that are diagnosed tomorrow."

Narendran said they've already been able to test a drug that blocks a receptor that helps the tumour grow. He said when the drug was added to a culture of AT/RT cells, they all died.

"They went into suicide mode. They turned on their internal killing mechanism, and they died," he said.