Andrew Napper, PhD, has joined the research team at the Nemours Center for Childhood Cancer Research (NCCCR) to establish its High Throughput Screening and Drug Discovery Laboratory. Dr. Napper comes to Nemours from the University of Pennsylvania, where he was the Director of High Throughput Screening for the Penn Center for Molecular Discovery, one of the original ten centers established as part of the National Institutes of Health’s Roadmap initiative to discover drugs for neglected diseases.
Cancers found in children are inherently different from those commonly seen in adults. Yet children are treated with drugs developed for adults. Although these drugs have saved the lives of many children, the side effects are severe. They most often affect health and development well beyond childhood and have a major impact throughout the lifespan of pediatric cancer survivors.
The goal of Dr. Napper’s work is to discover new drugs for childhood cancers.