Cancer researchers in Pittsburgh will continue work developing treatments for brain tumors with a new five-year, $6.24 million grant to the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

The money from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke will fund three projects led by principal investigator Dr. Ian Pollack, chief of the division of pediatric neurosurgery at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute brain tumor program.

The projects -- all aimed at new treatment strategies for a type of brain tumor known as gliomas -- are:

• Molecularly targeted therapies that interrupt signaling pathways in the brain that drive tumor growth (Dr. Pollack, investigator).

• Immunotherapy using segments of proteins that are overexpressed by brain tumors, to "vaccinate" patients against tumor growth (Dr. Hideho Okada, associate professor in neurological surgery and surgery at Pitt's medical school, investigator).

• Viral vectors to kill tumor cells while leaving other cells intact (Dr. Joseph C. Glorioso III and Dr. Paola Grandi, both of the medical school).