Back to the Future: The Incredible Egg

Figure legend: Shown is a chicken egg after using the Egg Topper. The membrane that lies under the shell is where we place fluorescent tumor cells to test their ability to move through blood and lymphatic vessels into the developing chick. Our hope is to find a number of drugs that slow or reverse the process of tumor cells metastasizing from one location to the next.

In 2008 we had an idea: we should try to identify drug treatments that help prevent the spread of tumor cells throughout the body, or at a minimum treat the cancer if it does spread. How could we go about doing this?

Tumor cells moving from one place in the body to another is a multi-step process. First, the tumor cell unattaches from its original location, Next it moves into a blood vessel or lymphatic channel and moves about the body. Finally the tumor cell exits the blood vessel and comes to rest at its final destination somewhere else in the body. Research of this complex process requires more than test tubes or petri dishes: for better or worse, this type of research needs to involve preclinical models (traditional research might use mice).

In 1962, Sidney Farber was investigating whether metastatic tumor cells from childhood cancer patients could move from the membrane under the shell of ordinary chicken eggs into the developing chick within the egg. This was a promising idea, as fertilized chicken eggs were inexpensive, and the assay (examination) takes only 12 days to complete. With over 45 years having passed since Farber’s investigation, and few pharmaceutical companies adopting this method to test anti-metastasis drugs, it seemed that many hurdles may lay ahead. This may have seemed like a high risk endeavor, but one that we believed in, and was embraced by Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation through an Innovation Award.

To date, we have overcome most technical hurdles of the assay by adapting modern genetic tools, new biomaterials for encapsulating of tumor cells, and new advances in imaging technology. We’ve also begun testing some novel new therapeutic agents. Of them, we are most intrigued by the effects of drugs that inhibit the metabolism of fast-twitch (anaerobic) muscle, which seems to have a particularly strong effect on the less curable form of the childhood muscle cancer, rhabdomyosarcoma.

So where do we go from here? The traditional answer might be we select the promising agents from the egg screening tests, write NIH grants to propose testing these drugs on other preclinical models (the grant review process can take more than a year from start to finish), and then see whether it is reasonable or feasible to move these drugs to clinical trials. Yet there are also surprising opportunities, too, made possible by ALSF – who is arranging introductions to pharmaceutical companies to accelerate the testing of new drugs for childhood cancer. ALSF is an exciting catalyst for innovation and new paradigms. Through the efforts of a group like ALSF, change can be tangible.

For more information about our research, please visit our blog at http://kellerlabblog.blogspot.com/ .

Sincerely,

Charles Keller, MD
Greehey Children’s Cancer Research Institute

'Service is its own reward' by Liz and Jay Scott

This week we wanted to do something a little differently on the blog. Below you will find an op-ed we wrote that appeared in the March 18, 2009 edition of The Philadelphia Inquirer. As you will find, it is our take on community service and the incentives that are being proposed to motivate young people to get involved. While we would love to see the number of youth participating in community service increase, we also know from firsthand experience that the true reward for participating is helping others, and not financial gain.

We stand behind the sentiments made below, and we think our thousands of stand hosts would feel the same way. Let us know what you think, do you agree?

COMMENTARY

Service is its own reward

By Liz and Jay Scott

Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation for Childhood Cancer

President Obama recently proposed incentives to get middle and high school students involved in community service, including financial aid for college. If young Americans commit to community service, Obama said, "We will make sure that you can afford a higher education."

We applaud the president's attempts to create change in our country, and a targeted community-service program has great potential to do just that. However, the financial benefits proposed should be secondary to another motivation: helping others.

Through Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation for Childhood Cancer, which was founded by our daughter, we have seen firsthand that young people reap the true rewards of community service in the satisfaction of doing good for others.

Our daughter Alexandra "Alex" Scott taught us many lessons in what would ultimately be her short lifetime. One of them was that sacrificing her own comforts for others made the biggest difference.

When Alex said she wanted to start a lemonade stand, we were happy to oblige, but we figured that she would want to buy something with the proceeds. We were surprised to hear that her only desire was to give the money to her hospital to help it make a difference for kids with cancer.

Since that time, parents and teachers have told us that their kids seem more motivated to run lemonade stands when the reward is helping others, rather than personal profit. Children have given up their birthday presents to collect donations, given their allowances or money earned through chores, and even collected loose change to contribute to the battle against childhood cancer.

If we monetize community service, offering rewards for doing good deeds, aren't we defeating the entire purpose?

Community service teaches us so many important things. Perhaps most valuable for the country, it builds character. It teaches us to care about each other and the experiences of those around us. It should be required so that we all grow as people, and that we do so together.

Through our experience with our daughter and the work of Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation, we have learned that many powerful lessons can be garnered from community service, and that perhaps the most important is pride in our own contributions to others.

We hope more Americans will commit to community service, and we also hope that they will do it for the right reasons. Education is important, but community service done for nothing more than the greater good might just be more important than anything an education can teach us about the world.

Childhood Cancer Heroes: Ilaria Easom

April 9, 2006. That was the day our world fell apart. The day those awful words, “Your daughter has cancer,” were delivered to us.

Our three-year-old daughter had been complaining of back pain and a husky voice for 3 weeks, but her doctor assured us nothing was wrong. Finally my wife insisted on more tests and after a chest x-ray revealed a mass in her chest cavity, we were rushed to the hospital for an emergency CT scan. The result? Cancer!

Despite the devastating news, we were warmed by the support we received from the hospital, our friends, family, colleagues and community. My employer granted me as much time off work as I needed, our medical teams became family and, to this day, we're still very close to them. One nurse would bring us coffee each morning, fresh fruit from her trees at home, and treats she had made for her family.

Friends and family visited or called each day and my wife's mommy group really stepped up to the plate - literally! They brought us lunch every day we were in the hospital - all without ever expecting us to pay them. In fact, most got offended when we did offer to pay for the food!

My daughter's play group sent hand made decorations and posters for her room that helped our three year old settle in and feel as comfortable as possible in such a sterile environment.

There were also the more formalized methods of support - the hospital social workers, local childhood cancer charities, counseling, child-life, the home infusion team...the list of those who supported us in one way or another seems endless.

After four rounds of chemotherapy and major surgery, our wonderfully brave and inspiring three-year-old entered remission. That’s when reality hit that we had huge medical bills to pay. We decided to hold a fundraiser to raise money for our medical bills. Local businesses freely donated gift certificates and products as raffle prizes, people we had never met before showed up to take part in our sponsored walk, checks arrived in the mail from people we had never heard of. By December, we'd received almost $5,000 in donations towards our medical expenses. We never expected that level of support and we can never say thank you enough times.

To this day, we continue our fund raising efforts but we now donate the money raised to those charities that supported us, to Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation, and to the pediatric cancer research lab at the local university hospital. The level of support we received opened our eyes to how wonderful people are and we hope to carry that torch with us, bringing its light to others in our situation. Helping ALSF is one small step towards that goal, but it's an important one and we're already planning our next annual lemonade stand for the Fall.

-Colin Easom, Ilaria's father

To read the blog in its entirety, and to learn more about all of Our Heroes, please visit AlexsLemonade.org

FREE iPod Recruiting Challenge on Facebook!

As you may know, Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation recently announced our 1 Million Member Mission on our Facebook Cause. While we have seen a great response since that time, we thought offering an incentive wouldn’t hurt! An anonymous donor came forward and offered an Apple iPod touch 8GB for ALSF to award to the top recruiter one month from today (April 6, 2009). In addition to the top recruiter, every person who recruits over 50 friends will receive an official Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation t-shirt!

So from now until Monday, April 6, 2009 at 12PM EST, invite all of your friends, and then re-invite them until they join the ALSF cause. This is your chance to get the word out about childhood cancer, while also potentially winning an iPod!

JOIN THE CAUSE!