Groups and Projects

The Molecular Diagnostics Group is involved in the establishment of diagnostic innovations and interpretation of results, but also drives the identification and characterization of novel genetic aberrations in pediatric gliomas of different grades.

The Preclinical Research Group conducts drug screens in childhood brain tumor models as well as preclinical experiments with pre-selected promising drugs, but at the same time aims at understanding the molecular make-up of embryonal brain tumors including atypical teratoid-rhabdoid tumors (AT/RT), embryonal tumors with multilayered rosettes (ETMR), and supratentorial primitive neuroectodermal tumors (stPNET) as well as ependymomas.

The Developmental Origins Group studies neurodevelopment to better understand how mutations in precursor and stem cells arising during normal development lead to pediatric brain cancer including medulloblastoma and glioma.

The Preclinical Modelling Group focuses on generating faithful brain tumor in vivo models and on utilizing these in functional and preclinical studies.

The Clinical Bioinformatics Group focuses on the identification and classification of genetic and epigenetic changes in childhood tumors using computational methods on large-scale genomic data sets. Research fields include immunogenomics, cancer predisposition(germline alterations), mutational signature analysis (somatic alterations), and analyses of the molecular basis for drug response across pediatric cancer.

More information about the individual groups can be found at the webpage of the Pediatric Neurooncology Center Heidelberg (see also the individual links above).