Baylor Institute for Immunology research seeks to develop vaccine to target triple negative breast cancer
Dr. Botond Igyarto
Even though detection rates and therapies for breast cancer have improved in recent decades, the disease is still the most frequently diagnosed and the second-leading cause of cancer-related deaths in women. In 2016, it is estimated that nearly 250,000 new cases will be diagnosed.
Triple negative breast cancer( TNBC) is an aggressive form of the disease that frequently metastasizes. The options for treatment are limited and a patient’ s survival following diagnosis is typically a year or less.
This emphasizes the urgent need for effective treatments for patients fighting this form of breast cancer. In the Celebrating Women Breast Cancer Research Lab, novel immunotherapies are being developed to treat these aggressive tumors. These therapies use a patient’ s own immune system to fight cancer cells and are emerging as a powerful alternative to standard chemotherapy and radiation therapy.
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Many of these new promising therapies rely on dendritic cells, an important component of the human immune system that orchestrates our body’ s defense against illness. In the past 20 years, the study of dendritic cells has exploded, and vaccines using dendritic cells are thought to be viable treatments for many diseases, from HIV to cancer. Scientists around the world now dedicate their lives to the study of dendritic cell vaccines, including Botond Igyarto, Ph. D., lead scientist at the Celebrating Women Breast Cancer Research Lab.
Since dendritic cells are master coordinators of all immune responses,
Dr. Igyarto’ s work focuses on developing injectable breast cancer vaccines that target these cells.
“ Dendritic cells come in different subsets, and there is a division of labor between the types. Some are specialized to fight bacterial infections, others viral or fungal pathogens,” said Dr. Igyarto.“ Based on this knowledge, we are testing the hypothesis that targeting vaccines to a specific subset of dendritic cell will promote superior cancer-fighting results.”
This dendritic cell-targeting is designed to activate the patient’ s immune system against the cancer via injection of a vaccine. The therapeutic