A promising class of drugs known as CD40 monoclonal antibodies could be the spark needed to light the fire in the immune system of patients who don’t respond to the newer cancer immunotherapies. Robert H. Vonderheide, MD, DPhil, director of the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania and an internationally renowned cancer immunotherapy expert, makes...
Tag: <span>tumors</span>
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Two immunotherapies used together for the first time to tackle tumors
Drs. Esteban Celis and Sharad Ghamande in the Georgia Cancer Center. Two immunotherapies – one that enables the T-cells a patient already has to better attack a tumor and another that can produce an independent and vigorous immune response – are being given together for the first time to help more patients wage a...
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Aspirin ‘cuts risk of several types of cancer by up to half’: Regularly taking the drug is thought to block enzymes that help tumours to grow
The cheap drug also reduced the odds of getting bowel cancer by a quarter It was was also found to reduce people’s chances of getting leukaemia, lung and prostate cancer The authors did not find a protective effect for breast, bladder or kidney cancers Taking aspirin regularly could help beat several types of cancer, a major...
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New Insights on the Addictions of Tumors
La Jolla, Calif., Oct. 5, 2017 – Researchers at Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute (SBP) and UC San Diego have shown that tumors can ensure a more reliable nutrient supply by eliminating the p62 protein in surrounding stromal tissue. Specifically, p62 deficiency helps tumors and stroma (supportive tissue outside the tumor) survive and grow,...
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Checkpoint inhibitors fire up different types of T cells to attack tumors
Anti-CTLA-4 and anti-PD-1 immunotherapies expand distinct immune infiltrates against cancer Cancer immunotherapies that block two different checkpoints on T cells launch immune attacks on cancer by expanding distinct types of T cell that infiltrate tumors, researchers from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center report in the journal Cell. “The mechanisms these two therapies use mostly...
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Stem cell vaccine found to increase immune responses, inhibit tumors in animal models
John Morris, M.D. Researchers at the University of Cincinnati (UC) have found that a cancer stem cell vaccine, engineered to express a pro-inflammatory protein called interleukin-15 (IL-15) and its receptor (IL-15Ralpha), caused T cell production in animal models and enhanced immune responses against tumors. This T cell production showed a cellular immune response that could lead to new...
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Atlases of immune cells surrounding tumors may guide immunotherapy
Fluorescent imaging of a tumor section identifies different types of macrophages (green) and T cells (blue) present in the microenvironment of renal cell carcinoma. Two independent studies have begun mapping the connections between and identities of the thousands of immune cells surrounding human tumors. One research group, looking at kidney cancer, found that tumors...
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Nanoparticles activate cellular memory to fight future tumors
The new method not only enlists the body’s immune system to destroy tumors, it teaches it to be on the lookout for their return The super-small objects known as nanoparticles are playing a big role in combating cancer. They’ve been used to deliver cancer-fighting drugs, to glow in the body to indicate chemotherapy’s efficacy; and to bring powerful...
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A New Treatment Destroyed Breast Cancer Tumors in 11 Days Without Chemo
Drug Combination A new clinical trial demonstrated positive effects caused by the drug combination lapatinib and trastuzumab against HER2 positive breast cancer in a treatment period of just 11 days. Led by researchers at the Institute of Cancer Research, London, the University of Manchester, and University Hospital of South Manchester, the study comprised 257 women with HER2 positive breast cancer who...
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Study unveils new way to starve tumors to death
Blocking cancer cells’ metabolism may make treatments more effective, less toxic Unlike a healthy cell, a sarcoma cell (above) relies on environmental sources of arginine, an important protein building block. Remove environmental arginine and the cell must begin a process called autophagy, or ‘self-eating,’ to survive. A second hit to its survival pathways then kills...