Date:December 15, 2017
Source:Columbia University Medical Center
Summary:Investigators have been trying to understand why and have recently found how an individual’s own genes can play a role in the response to the immunotherapy drugs.
Cancer cells arise when DNA is mutated, and these cells should be recognized as “foreign” by the immune system. However, cancer cells have found ways to evade detection by the immune system.
New drugs called immune checkpoint inhibitors can restore the immune system’s recognition of cancer cells and have led to dramatic responses in a number of cancer types.
But not everyone responds. Investigators at Columbia University’s Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center-led by Naiyer Rizvi, MD, and Timothy Chan, MD, PhD-have been trying to understand why and have recently found how an individual’s own genes can play a role in the response to the immunotherapy drugs. The complete findings were published Dec. 7 in Science.
More at: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/12/171215094518.htm
