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Immunotherapy capable of destroying aggressive forms of kidney cancer has been developed
American molecular biologists have developed an approach that allows the so-called “killer cells” of the immune system to be modified in such a way that they begin to actively destroy the most aggressive forms of malignant tumors in the kidneys. This was reported by the press service of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
“We have developed an approach that allows stem cells to be converted into immune cells that actively destroy tumors. They are suitable for use in the treatment of any patient, which allows us to circumvent one of the main problems of immunotherapy – the need to modify the cells of each individual patient. This speeds up therapy and avoids the risks associated with it, which is especially important for patients with aggressive forms of tumors,” said UCLA professor Lily Wu, whose words are quoted by the university’s press service.
The approach developed by scientists is aimed at combating one of the most aggressive and deadly subtypes of kidney cancer—renal cell carcinoma. Only 12% of patients live longer than five years after diagnosis and detection of metastases in other parts of the body, prompting scientists to seek additional methods of treating this form of cancer.
In the past, doctors have tried to use existing forms of immunotherapy to treat renal cell carcinoma, but all of them have been extremely ineffective due to the inability of “reprogrammed” T cells to penetrate the tumor and survive inside it for a long time. Biologists in the US have discovered that so-called “killer cells,” one of the components of the innate immune system responsible for destroying infected and damaged cells, do not have these problems.
The researchers discovered that killer cells can be simultaneously grown and reprogrammed to increase their aggressiveness towards tumors using a special set of reagents and cultures of so-called HSPC stem cells. To do this, the scientists built special receptors into the grown “killer cells” that allow them to recognize kidney tumor cells that produce unusually high levels of the CD70 protein molecule.
Preclinical trials conducted by the researchers showed that the modified “killer cells” were able to penetrate tumors and ignore signals that suppress the activity of T cells and other components of the immune system. As a result, they survived longer inside the tumors and metastases and actively destroyed their cells, slowing the growth of renal cell carcinoma. This gives hope that a similar effect will be achieved in clinical trials, concluded Professor Wu and her colleagues.
About immunotherapy
In recent years, doctors have begun to actively use immunotherapy methods to fight cancer. As a rule, doctors grow cultures of certain types of T cells, as well as other immune cells, and “reprogram” them in a special way, which causes these cells to attack specific types of tumor cells. The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded in 2018 for the development of one of the first forms of immunotherapy, which involves suppressing the PD-1 receptor.
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