Source: American Association for Cancer Research
Date: April 2, 2012
Summary:
PHILADELPHIA — Scientists may have discovered a new paradigm for immunotherapy against cancer by priming antibodies and T cells with cancer stem cells, according to a study published in Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.
In the study, the researchers extracted cancer stem cells from two immunocompetent mouse models and used them to prepare the vaccine. They discovered that the enriched cancer stem cells were immunogenic and much for effective more effective as an antigen source compared with the unselected tumor cells normally used in previous immunotherapy trials. The researchers also found that cytotoxic T lymphocytes harvested from cancer stem cell-vaccinated hosts were capable of killing cancer stem cells in vitro.
