2024-02-14 18:43:28
American researchers are on the trail of a new technique which could make it possible to increase the effectiveness of certain immune cells against cancer cells by a hundred.
And paradoxically, it is by studying the genetic mutations that cause malignant T cells to cause a type of cancer (lymphoma) that researchers from the University of California at San Francisco and Northwestern University have identified a gene that could increase the effectiveness of healthy T cells, without making them toxic. “The (study) authors said, wait a minute. If T cell cancers cause these T cells to survive, proliferate and form tumors, perhaps there are messages inside these cancerous T cells that could improve proliferation and function of normal T lymphocytes,” summarized Doctor Jean-Sébastien Delisle, an expert who is notably the medical director of the Center of Excellence in Cellular Therapy at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital.
Even though the field of immunotherapy is booming and is at the origin of the most promising breakthroughs made in the fight against cancer over the past ten years, the therapy cannot currently be used in all patients. Cancer remains a formidable adversary that is a master in the art of exploiting the body’s resources to survive. It also fiercely resists attacks by the immune system, to the point where T cells – whether natural or developed in the laboratory – end up exhausting themselves before having destroyed it. The genetic mutation identified by American researchers, however, gives healthy T cells superior capacities which allow them to survive and fight longer in the toxic environment generated by the tumor. The T cells created by these scientists were able to attack and destroy skin, lung and stomach cancers in mice.
But it is still a little early to declare victory, believes Doctor Delisle. “(The American researchers) did a somewhat short follow-up in a mouse model to reassure us,” he said. We must understand that we are playing with fire. We introduce cancerous abnormalities into normal lymphocytes and the last thing we want is for these lymphocytes to become cancerous.” The study shows the effectiveness of modified T lymphocytes in the short term, added Dr. Delisle, “but the greatest strength of immunotherapy is its ability to last over time. And that has not yet been demonstrated.” The search for and identification of genes that make it possible to improve the efficiency of T lymphocytes nevertheless remains “an extremely promising avenue of research,” concluded Dr. Delisle, and several teams are interested in it around the world. The conclusions of this study were published by the prestigious scientific journal Nature.
Photo credit: AP Photo/Gerry Broome, File.
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