Neuro-Oncology: A New Science Backed with a Century of Experience

More than 20,000 people in the United States will be diagnosed with cancers arising in brain or spinal cord this year, reports the American Cancer Society. Cancer is the second leading cause of death in children in the United States, with brain tumors' lethality second to only leukemia. Brain cancer poses a unique challenge to cancer research and neuroscience, and its study demands a unique research environment, one that recognizes the special nature of the central nervous system and the tumors that develop there.

Brain tumor research is a relatively modern science that parallels the explosion of molecular biology and modern neuroimaging. While the science is new, Mayo Clinic Cancer Center's Neuro-Oncology Program has its roots in Mayo's long history of brain cancer treatment and research stretching back over 100 years.

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