Noxopharm Limited announced a formal collaboration with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) within the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the quest for more effective treatments of brain cancer. The collaboration relates to a new family of molecules designed by Noxopharm scientists that combines the traditional role of chemotherapy drugs (killing cancer cells directly), with a unique ability to block `helper' growth signals coming from neighbouring healthy cells. Those 'helper' signals from neighbouring stromal cells have emerged as an important contributor to the highly aggressive nature of certain cancers, notably cancers of the brain, pancreas and bile duct. Noxopharm believes that it has achieved this objective in pre-clinical studies, combining potent killing of cancer cells with a secondary action that blocks the action of the `helper' growth signals in a well-tolerated way. The objective is a drug that will convert aggressive brain cancers in adults and children into slow-growing cancers more able to be effectively managed by other treatments such as surgery and radiotherapy. The new Noxopharm drugs kil brain cancer cel s directly in a similar way to idronoxil. However, an additional design feature has been added that blocks the ability of the cancer cel s to respond to glutamate, and to do so in a way that preserves general brain function.