Immune System Offers Clues to Cancer Treatment

November 26, 2014

(Nature) – In the quest to develop personalized cancer therapies, researchers are increasingly examining an individual’s immune response to cancer to find ways to tailor treatments. The shift comes with the emergence of therapies designed to unleash the immune system on cancer cells. Five studies in the 27 November issue of Nature turn to the immune system to investigate which patients are likely to respond to cancer drugs that inhibit the activity of a protein called PD-1, and how tumours trigger immune responses. The approach is in contrast to earlier attempts at personalised therapies that focused on the tumour itself.