Researchers are now closer to cancer immunotherapy

Researchers from the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute are a step closer to potential cancer immunotherapy involving switching off a regulatory cell to stop tumours growing and spreading.A journal of the American Association for Cancer Research - Cancer Discovery, published the findings in a study.Head of QIMR Berghofer's Cancer Immunoregulation and Immunotherapy Laboratory, Associate Professor Michele Teng, said that the study could potentially help in treating such cancer patients for whom no other current immunotherapies have worked out."Our work on mice shows for the first time that many tumours display the molecule MR1 on their cell surface, and when it's present, this molecule turns on an important regulatory cell that prevents the body's own immune system from fighting cancer," said Teng.Teng found that a type of regulatory cell called mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) stop immune cells (T) or white blood cells (NK) from attacking and killing off tumour cells when ..