High-Risk Neuroblastoma and Rhabdoid Tumors: New Clinical Insights and Challenges (Second Edition)

Dear Colleagues,

Neuroblastoma is the most common extracranial solid tumor in young children and typically presents at an average age of 1 to 2 years. Occasionally, newborns can present with metastatic neuroblastoma, and adolescents or younger adults can also be affected. In newborns, even disseminated neuroblastoma can spontaneously regress without any therapy, whereas metastasized neuroblastoma in toddlers and older patients is highly aggressive and associated with a poor prognosis. Approximately half of the toddlers and older children with a neuroblastoma present with a local tumor (low risk) and a good prognosis and the other half with a disseminated tumor (high risk) and a poor prognosis. These features make neuroblastoma a tumor with one of the highest spontaneous regression rates, on the one hand. and one of the most aggressive tumors, on the other, due to its tendency to recur after initial treatment. The biology behind these features is slowly beginning to be understood, but there are still major challenges, especially in the treatment of high-risk patients. Current therapies comprise intensive chemotherapy, radiation, autologous or even allogeneic stem cell transplantation, targeted therapies, tumor vaccination approaches, monoclonal antibodies, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cells, and combinations of these methods.

Carrying on from the success of the first edition of the Special Issue “High-Risk Neuroblastoma: New Clinical Insights and Challenges”, this second edition welcomes authors to submit original papers or reviews on current and future new diagnostic and treatment strategies which will hopefully improve the currently poor prognosis of children with high-risk neuroblastoma.

In this second edition, we also invite original research papers regarding new treatment strategies for rhabdoid tumors. Despite the discovery of some underlying mechanisms of tumor development, such as mutations in the SMARCB1 gene resulting in the inactivation of the tumor-suppressive SWI/SNF protein complex, the outcome for patients is still poor despite aggressive standard therapy including surgery, chemotherapy, and irradiation. A better understanding of the biology of these tumors might lead to more effective therapies including targeted therapy and/or immunotherapy.

Prof. Dr. Rupert Handgretinger
Prof. Dr. Johannes Hubertus Schulte
Guest Editors

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• neuroblastoma
• rhabdoid tumor
• autologous stem cell transplantation
• allogeneic stem cell transplantation immunotherapy
• anti-GD2 antibody
• targeted therapy
• CAR T-cells

• High-Risk Neuroblastoma: New Clinical Insights and Challenges in Journal of Clinical Medicine (12 articles)