TRPV1 and central nervous system cancer: Stock et al. (2012) have shown that high-grade astrocytoma-associated NPCs induce tumor cell death via the release of endovanilloids, which induce Ca2+ responses. Endovanilloids directly stimulate the vanilloid receptor TRPV1 (Toth et al., 2009). However, the anti-tumorigenic response of NPCs is lost with age. Stock et al. (2012) report that NPC-mediated tumor suppression can be mimicked in the adult brain by systemic administration of the synthetic brain barrier-permeable vanilloid Arvanil (Figure 2), suggesting that TRPV1 agonists hold potential as new high-grade glioma therapeutics.