Paediatric cancer articles from across Nature Portfolio

Targeting oncogenic ALK activity in neuroblastoma is an attractive therapeutic strategy but success has been limited by resistance to ALK inhibitors. Here, the authors identify loss of miR-1304-5p as a driver of ALK inhibitor resistance via regulation of NRAS, and therapeutically target this axis with the addition of a farnesyltransferase inhibitor in preclinical models of neuroblastoma.

This study identifies temporal and coordinately regulated cell-state-specific super-enhancers driving the expression of transcription factors that control circuits needed to switch neuroblastoma tumor cells from self-renewal to differentiation.

In an observational study evaluating functional precision medicine in children and adolescents with relapsed or refractory solid and hematologic malignancies, it was feasible to provide personalized treatment recommendations to treating physicians on the basis of genomic profiling and ex vivo drug sensitivity testing within 4 weeks.

A functional genomics approach in patient derived cell lines of Favorable Histology Wilms Tumor identifies suppression of TRIP13 through the nuclear export inhibitor, KPT-330, leads to decreased viability and synergy with doxorubicin.

Hepatoblastoma (HB) is the most frequent paediatric liver tumour with heterogeneous cellular phenotypes that influence clinical outcomes. Here, the authors integrate bulk, single-cell, and spatial multi-omics to characterise HB cells, and find that clonal evolution and epigenetic plasticity shape response to therapy.

Sánchez-Guixé et al. investigated the possible routes to second malignancies in survivors of paediatric cancer by studying four such clinical cases.

Although childhood cancer survival rates have increased globally, there is a markedly inequitable distribution of these advances. Here, Monica Gramatges summarizes these challenges and provides the reader with strategies and solutions that begin to address factors that contribute to these inequities.

The response rates of pediatric cancers to immune checkpoint inhibitor therapies are disappointingly low, particularly when compared to the remarkable impact of these drugs in many adult cancers. A new study leverages clinical trial data to identify biomarkers that might improve patient selection in future clinical trials.