The final two participants in the summer 2016 research program have arrived in the Children’s Brain Tumor Project (CBTP) lab. Matthew Bernstein, who lost his brother Zachary to DIPG and who currently serves as the Youth Volunteer Coordinator for his family’s Fly a Kite Foundation, will spend August helping kick-start our efforts to build a database of thalamic glioma samples. These samples, in combination with the data we are assembling through the online Thalamic Glioma Registry, will be invaluable in new, specific research efforts dedicated to these rare brain tumors. Matthew's work is funded by the Samuel Jeffers Childhood Cancer Foundation. (Find out more about the Thalamic Glioma Registry and the Fly a Kite Foundation.)
Benjamin Shtaynberger has also joined Dr. Greenfield’s team to assist in assembling and evaluating the data that will form the basis for a new academic paper on gliomatosis cerebri (GC). Data collected from our online GC Registry and from cell lines growing in the CBTP lab, once shared with other researchers, will drive the entire field forward and spur additional avenues of inquiry worldwide.
Matthew and Ben complete the “Summer Sprint” team for 2016. This remarkable surge also includes Jared Bassett, Tina Bharani, Raymond Chang, Emilie George, Christopher Marnell, Fatima Nathalia Morales, and Umberto Tosi, and has been funded through the generosity of the Cristian Rivera Foundation and its supporters Darlene Rodriguez, Andy Epstein, Craig Serra, and Carlos Colon; Alex’s Lemonade Stand; the Samuel Jeffers Foundation; the St. Baldrick’s Foundation; the AANS/NREF; and Weill Cornell Medical College. This unique combination of talent, funding, and dedication will lay the foundation for new clinical trials and new grant applications.
More about Tina Bharani and Jared Bassett’s project
More about Fatima Morales’ work
More about the Children's Brain Tumor Project
