killer T cells to attack the cancer

[kent]

In part from Stanford at:

med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2013/05/anti-cd47-antibody-may-offer-new-route-to-successful-cancer-vaccination.html

Various researchers have been working over the years to create vaccines against cancer, but the resulting vaccines have not been highly effective. Current approaches to developing the vaccines rely on using immune cells called dendritic cells to introduce cancer protein fragments to T cells — a process known as antigen presentation. The hope has been that the process would stimulate the body’s T cells to identify cancer cells as diseased or damaged and target them for elimination. However, this process often only modestly activates the most potent cancer-fighting kind of T cell, called killer T cells or CD8+ T cells.

The Stanford team discovered that there was another viable vaccine approach, using the macrophage pathway to program killer T cells against cancer. Irving Weissman, MD, professor of pathology and of developmental biology, and his team previously showed that nearly all cancers use the molecule CD47 as a “don’t-eat-me” signal to escape from being eaten and eliminated by macrophages. The researchers.......

[djAdvocate]

cool stuff.  i have been hearing about this through the grapevine for close to a year.

[kent]

Sept 1, 2014 12:43:45 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

cool stuff.  i have been hearing about this through the grapevine for close to a year.

Yep, it sure is. Stanford has had a few spots on the radio the last week or so. As such, it "looks" like they are moving ahead - I sure hope this pans out.

[djAdvocate]

Sept 1, 2014 12:52:33 GMT -5 kent said:

Sept 1, 2014 12:43:45 GMT -5 djAdvocate said:

cool stuff.  i have been hearing about this through the grapevine for close to a year.

Yep, it sure is. Stanford has had a few spots on the radio the last week or so. As such, it "looks" like they are moving ahead - I sure hope this pans out.

me too.  i have seen cancer take a few people down.  it is not pretty.

[mmhmm]

I feel this to be a very important discovery, too. I'd sure like to see it develop into something that will help to eliminate this horrible disease.