BRAIN CANCER: SEARCHING FOR A BREAKTHOUGH WITH GENE AND CELL THERAPY Symposium Open to the Public, Thursday January 28, 2010, 7:00 p.m., Bruce Museum

There were an estimated 22,070 new cases of brain and other nervous system cancers diagnosed in 2009 – that is approximately an eight percent increase in the incidence of brain cancer since 2005.  Of those diagnosed, 48 percent will survive.  The Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy, the only national non-profit committed exclusively to cancer gene therapy research, is listening intently for good news regarding this insurgent form of cancer.  It is impossible not to address the apparent increased incidence of this disease, which has indiscriminately taken the lives of national celebrities, politicians, amongst them Senator Ted Kennedy, and local residents, including young children.  The time is now for us to all look at this issue together and sort out its causes and hope for the future.

The Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy (ACGT), founded by local Greenwich residents Barbara and Edward Netter, is a leader in funding and promoting research into all forms of cancer.  ACGT is offering the topic of brain cancer for its 2010 educational program, with three highly credentialed leading scientists who will share insights and progress on innovative approaches to the treatment of this devastating disease using cells and genes as “medicine.”  In addition to the informal presentations and discussion amongst the presenters, the program will then be open to questions and answers. This presentation, which is free and open to the public, will be held onThursday, January 28, 2010, at 7:00 p.m., at the Bruce Museum, One Museum Drive, in Greenwich, Conn. For more information, please call Betty Condon at 203-358-8000 or email bcondon@acgtfoundation.org <mailto:fyoung@acgtfoundation.org> .

Robert Martuza, M.D., F.A.C.S., Chief of Neurosurgery at Massachusetts General Hospital and William and Elizabeth Sweet Professor of Neuroscience at Harvard Medical School, also a member of ACGT’s scientific advisory committee, will moderate the program, including two ACGT Research Fellows involved in innovative brain cancer projects, Miguel Sena-Esteves, Ph.D., Associate Professor Department of Neurology and Gene Therapy Center, University of Massachusetts Medical School, and Antonio E. Chiocca, M.D., Ph.D., Chairman, Department of Neurological Surgery, The Ohio State University Medical Center and James Cancer Hospital.