Study: Lymph Nodes Supply Body With T Cells to Attack Cancer

Investigators from the Yale Cancer Center have found that these immune system fighters can slow tumor growth.

T cells that contain certain lymph nodes could be natural cancer fighters, according to the results of a new study by the Yale Cancer Center.

“Therapies that use the immune system to destroy cancer have been a game-changer for patients with lung and other cancers,” Nikhil Joshi, PhD, assistant professor of immunobiology at the Center of Immuno-Oncology at Yale Cancer Center, said in a statement. “But not all people respond to immunotherapy drugs, so it was important for us to discover the role of these special T cells in tumor growth.”

Investigators used a new animal model to determine how the stem-like T cell can survive and what it looks like over the course of several months of tumor growth.

They discovered that the T cells cannot live for very long, which means that they must be resupplied from somewhere else, which seems to be the nearby lymph nodes, the statement said.

Investigators think that this is essential for slowing the grown of cancer, which could aid the response to immunotherapy, according to the statement.

Reference

Study shows stem-like T cells could aid immunotherapy in cancer treatment. EurekAlert. News release. September 3, 2021. Accessed September 7, 2021. https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/927356