La Jornada: Cell therapy would help combat glioblastoma, a deadly brain cancer

According to a group of scientists, a new immunotherapy could represent a breakthrough in the fight against brain cancer, after showing promising results against glioblastoma, the most aggressive and deadly form of this type of disease.

Patients diagnosed with this disease usually survive only 12 to 18 months. Experts from King’s College London and McMaster University in Canada have conducted laboratory studies suggesting that CAR-T cell (chimeric antigen receptor T cell) therapy could be a viable treatment. This therapy teaches the body’s immune system to recognize and attack cancer cells, and has already demonstrated dramatic results in other cancer patients. Some CAR-T cell treatments are already routinely available on the NHS.

In the new study, which used glioblastoma models that replicate human biology, including patient tumors, CAR-T therapy eliminated tumors and suggested prolonged disease-free survival.

Lead author of the research, Professor Sheila Singh, Professor of Neuro-oncology and Neurosurgery at King’s College London and McMaster University, explained: “Glioblastoma is not made up solely of cancer cells. A large part of the tumor is made up of immune cells called macrophages.

“Normally, these cells help defend the body against infection, but glioblastoma can recruit and reprogram them to help the tumor grow, suppress immune attacks, and resist treatment.”

The researchers identified a protein called GPNMB in both glioblastoma cells and these macrophages that promote tumor growth.

The CAR-T cells were modified to recognize GPNMB, and the team was able to demonstrate how glioblastoma could be attacked on two fronts at once.

Tumor-immune

Singh said, “Instead of treating glioblastoma simply as a mass of cancer cells, we should consider it as an interconnected tumor-immune ecosystem.

“Our approach focuses on both the tumor and the environment that allows it to proliferate. By going beyond cancer cells, we are also attacking immune cells that help protect the tumor from treatment,” he added.

Dr Karen Noble, director of research and policy at the British organization Brain Tumor Research, explained: “Every year around 3,200 cases of glioblastoma are diagnosed in the UK and, unfortunately, only 4 per cent of those diagnosed survive five years or more.

“These results are really promising, especially since CAR-T therapy has been used successfully in other areas of cancer, so we hope that this innovation can be quickly applied to patients.”

He stressed that advances in the laboratory will only change the story for the brain tumor patient community once they become treatments in clinics.

Shan Grewal, co-senior author of the study and a professor at McMaster University, said most previous approaches have focused solely on killing glioblastoma cancer cells. “Our work suggests that we may also need to dismantle the immune support system that helps glioblastoma survive,” he added.