Functional Analysis of Molecular Alterations in Brain Tumours: from fishing to function

Brain tumours consist of primary or de novo tumours, and secondary tumours. The latter group consists of metastasis derived from primary tumours at another location within the body, for example breast or lung. The primary brain tumours form a heterogeneous group of different tumour types with variable prognoses. In adults, the most common types of brain tumour are the meningiomas (mainly benign) and gliomas. In children, although gliomas occur, other tumours are more frequent and include primitive neuroectodermal tumours (PNETs) and medulloblastoma. Pilocytic astro‐cytomas and ependymomas, a specific type of glioma, also mainly occur in children.