Division of Brain Tumor Translational Research

Research Activities

Brain tumors are usually invasive, thus hard to treat.  Recently, sequencing technology is drastically developed.  Many researchers including us are sequencing several types of malignant tumors to reveal how these tumors form and why some of the tumors are refractory to current therapies.  We are working on the sequencing analysis of brain tumors to lead to the development of novel therapies.

Glioma is the most common type of malignant brain tumor in adults.  Gliomas are divided into Grade I to IV based on WHO classification.  We analyzed 757 cases with Grade II and III glioma and revealed the mutational landscape (H Suzuki et al., Nature Genetics. 2015).  Our work contributed to the revised WHO classification in 2016 where the molecular diagnosis is employed.

Medulloblastoma is the most common malignant brain tumor in the paediatric population.  We found a novel mutation of the non-coding gene, U1 small nuclear RNA (U1 snRNA) (H Suzuki et al., Nature 2019).  The U1 snRNA is the most frequently mutated gene in medulloblastoma and has the potential to develop a novel therapeutic strategy.

We are analyzing sequencing data to uncover the detailed mechanisms in brain tumors to lead to novel effective therapies.