Cancer is a moving target. Your immune system is the only thing in your body that can move with it.
Cancer differs not only from one patient to another, but also within the same patient. Cancer cells can mutate rapidly, enabling them to develop resistance to chemotherapies or even escape detection by the immune system. While a healthy immune system is constantly learning about potential threats and how to deal with them, occasionally, it needs help. Cancers create smoke and mirrors to avoid their destruction by your immune system, such as by actively suppressing or inactivating immune cells, by preventing the arrival of more immune cells, or by losing or mutating the tags that allowed them to be recognized by the immune system in the first place. Cancer immunotherapies are designed to give your immune system a boost, and they hold immense promise to provide cures for many cancers. It is no surprise that in the last 10 years, we have seen immunotherapies become mainstays in the treatment of cancer. Our researchers are developing new solutions that would improve the efficacy and safety profiles of immunotherapies. In addition, we are developing personalized approaches to immunotherapy, based on identifying the barriers to immunotherapy for each individual patient.
