Dr Carmela de Santo
University of Birmingham
Awarded: £49,957
We are delighted to be collaborating with the Grace Kelly Cancer Trust. Each charity will commit funds equally to this important research project.
The challenge
Immunotherapy, which activates the patient’s own immune system to attack and kill cancer cells, has shown impressive clinical results in blood cancers. Unfortunately, there has been limited success with immunotherapy in other cancers, such as sarcoma. This may be because solid tumours like sarcoma generate a hostile environment, including cells which can switch off the immune response in several types of sarcomas. These are called myeloid derived suppressor cells (MDSCs).
How will this project tackle this challenge?
In this project, the team will endeavour to stop MDSCs from working, by activating key immune cells (called iNKT cells). This in turn will allow the immune system to target and kill childhood sarcoma. These iKNT cells also have a strong ability to penetrate tissue and induce cell death – another way of killing the sarcoma. The team will also study how the immune cells and childhood sarcoma cells interact with each other. The project team will work with an active group of patients at Birmingham Children’s Hospital who would donate blood samples to this ethically approved project.
What this means for people affected by sarcoma
This project will determine whether iNKT cells are key to making immunotherapy more effective in sarcoma patients. There has been success with iNKT therapy for adult clinical trials, with a number of companies investing already in Phase I/II clinical trials. A small amount of research has shown therapy of this sort could improve survival in children too. In the long term, the team also hope that this work could provide the scientific basis for an early phase clinical trial for children with sarcoma.
