Anti-CTLA-4 immunotherapy creates new T cells while freeing them to fight
Nobel Laureate Jim Allison, Ph.D., invented immune checkpoint blockade immunotherapy by blocking the CTLA-4 protein on T cells, freeing those killer immune cells to attack cancer. Now Allison and colleagues have shown that thwarting CTLA-4 also liberates T cells to assume new identities, including one that’s vital to an effective response against tumors.
In a paper in the April edition of Immunity, the researchers show that CTLA...
Amplifying genetic testing to better prevent hereditary cancers
Testing for BRCA1 and BRCA2 seeks to identify mutations associated with increased risk of developing certain cancers over a person’s lifetime...
Combination chemotherapy before blood stem cell transplant improves progression-free survival
A randomized Phase III clinical trial combining two common chemotherapy agents as a pre-stem cell transplant treatment at The University of...
Shielding healthy organs from radiotherapy for pancreatic cancer
Unresectable pancreatic cancer is usually fatal because other treatments, such as radiation therapy, cannot be used. Radiation therapy causes toxicity in the adjacent healthy tissue of important and sensitive organs, such as the small intestine, which can lead to internal bleeding.
In a recently published study in Scientific Reports, a Nature journal, researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and Rice University...
