I am a cancer biologist focusing on cancer arising from
the sympatho-adrenal linage, such as childhood
neuroblastoma, a heterogeneous malignancy spanning
from spontaneous remission to fatal metastatic disease. I
plan to analyze primary neuroblastoma tumors provided
by the Karolinska Hospital that are characterized on stage,
outcome, MYCN and 1p-status and genomic profile group.
25 tumors of either high stage (unfavorable, stage-4), high
stage that spontaneously regress (4S) and low stage with
good prognosis (no evidence of disease) will be analyzed
using single cell transcriptomics to investigate
heterogeneity, maturation and the identification of small
sub-groups within a heterogenic tumor. I will ask if
signatures from single cell analysis of the “bad” versus
“good” neuroblastoma include fate decision-related gene
expression clusters prominent in early or late embryonic
sympathoblast/crest populations discovered in single cell
analysis of mouse crest and sympatho-adrenal anlage.