Tyler's parents helped announce a new establishment called the Tyler Trent Pediatric Cancer Research Center.
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind — More than four years after Tyler Trent’s passing from the rare bone cancer osteosarcoma, Purdue University is making sure the former graduate and devoted Boilermaker will live on through research.
In the first quarter of Purdue's Hammer Down Cancer football game against Ohio State University, Tyler's parents helped announce a new establishment called the Tyler Trent Pediatric Cancer Research Center.
"I think it's much more than a football game, it's remembering it's going to take us all to win this battle," said Tony Trent, Tyler's father. "You think of all of the prominent names that are on the buildings here at Purdue and my son is in that category. You have to pinch yourself that this is actually happening."
Andy Mesecar, the director of the cancer institute and the Walther Professor in Cancer Structural Biology, said Trent’s legacy will live on in the disease-fighting advancements researchers are working on to end cancers.
“The new Tyler Trent center and the interdisciplinary research that take place here will set us apart from other pediatric cancer research centers. Our combination of scientific talent is uniquely Purdue. There is really nothing else like this," Mesecar said.
Michael Childress is a professor of medicine who will work within the new Trent center and has been researching osteosarcoma as a cancer institute researcher. He is now dedicated to what he says is an urgent cause.
“A third of patients diagnosed with osteosarcoma die from it, and these are mostly adolescents. That’s a real tragedy that speaks to the need to continue to push the envelope and look for new ways to improve the outlook for those patients,” Childress said.
The Trent family was among the first to support the research of the new center with a gift of $100,000. Tyler's mother, Kelly, talked about how they will turn the sadness of his loss into something productive and meaningful.
“There are hardly words to articulate what this means,” Kelly said. “As a parent who has lost a child, the best gift you can give me is to remember my child and celebrate him. One of Tyler’s passions, as many know, was pediatric cancer research, and to have his name attached to a center doing that work, in his honor, is absolutely priceless! Words and a thank-you to the Purdue cancer institute are just not enough. Words feel inadequate for how grateful we are as a family.”
"He would think this was his biggest honor he's received in all of his time," added Kelly.
Boilermaker fans and friends can donate to the Tyler Trent Pediatric Cancer Research Center right here.
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