Tumor-promoting immune cells retrained to fight most aggressive type of brain cancer

Regulatory T cells in the brain can be reprogrammed from guarding glioblastoma tumors to attacking them from within

2021-05-11

(Press-News.org) BOSTON - It's a real-life plot worthy of a classic spy novel: Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and other Boston-area research centers are turning the tables on glioblastomas, the most devastating and aggressive form of brain cancer, by transforming a type of cell that normally protects tumors and inhibits effective drug therapy into a stone-cold glioblastoma killer.

Glioblastoma, a type of brain tumor, is rapidly fatal: Most patients die within two years of diagnosis despite aggressive therapies such as brain surgery, whole-brain radiation and chemotherapy.

Despite hopes that a class of drugs known as immune checkpoint blockers (ICBs) - drugs that have revolutionized the treatment of patients with malignant melanoma, non-small-cell lung cancer, and other solid tumors - could also benefit patients with glioblastoma, ICBs have not been effective against the disease in clinical trials to date.

ICBs work by removing the brakes on the immune system, allowing previously inactive immune cells to recognize, attack and destroy mutated, cancerous cells while causing minimal damage to the normal tissues.

But as Rakesh K. Jain, PhD, director of the Edwin L. Steele Laboratories in the Department of Radiation Oncology at MGH, and colleagues show in a study published in END

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Tumor-promoting immune cells retrained to fight most aggressive type of brain cancer

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