Outsmarting RAS in Rhabdomyosarcoma Research

Did you know scientists can use viruses to fight cancer? It sounds wild, but it’s real.

Eleanor Chen, M.D., Ph.D., is a researcher at the University of Washington who studies a tough childhood cancer called rhabdomyosarcoma. This cancer grows in soft tissues, like muscles.

It can be very hard to treat, especially when a protein called RAS mutates. When that happens, RAS tells cancer cells to grow like crazy, and not stop.

Thanks to early research funding from Rally Foundation, Dr. Chen and her team tried something new: using a special virus to attack those out-of-control cancer cells.

And it worked! The virus could find and target the cancer cells with the RAS mutation, while leaving healthy cells alone.

Their work was published in Molecular Therapy Oncolytics, and it helped other scientists understand more about why this type of cancer is so hard to treat.

That first project, funded by Rally, opened the door to even bigger funding from the Department of Defense.

Now, Dr. Chen is continuing her work to bring better treatments to kids with cancer.

This is why early-stage research funding matters.   

This is the power of philanthropic seed investing. 

This is Rally.