Research projects

Professor Chris Jones, Glioma Group

Paediatric high grade and diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG)

The Jones laboratory is primarily focused on high grade gliomas which arise in children, either supratentorially, or within the brainstem. These tumours appear to have key biological and clinical distinctions, both to each other, and histologically similar lesions in adults.

To this end we have current projects focussed on:

• Genomic and epigenomic profiling of glial tumours of childhood, including large retrospective studies, prospective clinical trial cohorts, and rare entities such as infant glioma and gliomatosis cerebri
• Model development and preclinical screening of paediatric glioma subgroups, with specific projects focussing on the development of novel therapies directed against ACVR1, histone H3.3 G34R/V and ATRX mutations
• Intratumoral heterogeneity and subclonal co-operation between distinct cancer stem cell subpopulations, with a view to using disruption of these interactions as a novel area for therapeutic intervention