Immune discovery exposes cancer cells’ camouflage

Monash researchers have uncovered the mechanism used by a common type of blood cancer to hide itself from the immune system.

The discovery breaks brand new ground in the search for a cure for Chronic Lymphocytic Leukaemia (CLL) - the most common adult leukaemia in the developed world.  It affects B cells – white blood cells that in healthy people are responsible for producing antibodies to fight off infections. Most CLL patients die of other diseases because their bodies can no longer protect itself against them.

Lead researcher Professor Fabienne Mackay, from the Department of Immunology, said current leukaemia treatments involve killing all B cells – both cancerous and healthy – leaving patients even more vulnerable to secondary infections than they were due to the cancer.

“It turns out that cancer cells are very good at sabotaging the immune system, using various tricks that confuse immune cells and ‘smoke screens’ preventing immune cells from recognising the cancer,” said Professor Mackay.

Professor Mackay, PhD candidate Damien Easton-Saulep and other researchers have pinpointed exactly how CLL confuses the immune system, and devised a way to stop it without destroying the patient’s immune system.

Professor Mackay said their discovery paves the way for the creation of treatments that allow the body to naturally fight the cancer itself.

“The best weapon we have for fighting cancer is the immune system itself. It can sense the presence of an infection but also the emergence of a cancer,” says Professor Mackay.

B cells rely on a particular protein – called ‘B cell Activating Factor of the TNF Family’, or ‘BAFF’ – to survive. Each B cell has three different kinds of receptor that detect the presence of BAFF in the blood, called TACI, BAFF-R and BCMA.

Researchers discovered that in CLL patients, the TACI receptors of cancerous B cells over-produce a protein called Interleukin-10 (IL-10), which tricks the immune system into thinking nothing is wrong with the body, allowing the cancer to thrive undetected.

“We found that when the receptor called TACI was blocked, it prevented the secretion of IL-10 without eliminating normal B cells,” said Professor Mackay.

“Without IL-10, the tumour can no longer keep the immune system at bay, which means the patient’s immune system can be ‘kick-started’ again to fight infections and cancers.

This is very exciting, because it means that the B cells stay alive and well to do their job in the immune system fighting other infections. It also means the over production of IL-10 is stopped, and the CLL tumour cells are now exposed to immune cells specialized in fighting cancers,” Professor Mackay said.

Professor Mackay and her team believe their findings may be relevant across a number of types of cancer, potentially revolutionising the way they are treated.

Article reference and full text

Crowdfunding boost for burns victims: Your vote counts!

Dr Shiva Akbarzadeh's Thinkable.org entry - Please vote!

You can help medical research at Monash win a cash prize by voting for it in the Thinkable 'Inspire Australia' competition.

New skin substitutes tailor-made for severe burns victims could become a reality through the work of a group of scientists led by Dr Shiva Akbarzadeh, and a boost from crowdfunding site, Thinkable.

Dr Akbarzadeh, a skin biologist at The Alfred hospital and Monash University, researches growing artificial skin in the laboratory using patients’ own cells that can be applied instead of skin grafts.

“The gold standard for treating deep burns is skin grafts,” Dr Akbarzadeh said. “That is difficult when a patient has massive burns and not enough donor sites, as happens in extensive burns.”

Dr Akbarzadeh’s Skin Tissue Culture Laboratory has developed techniques to create composite skin in the laboratory that is close to native skin.

“Our goal is to enable surgeons to replace both dermal and epidermal layers of damaged skin with tissue engineered skin in a single procedure. This will speed up wound healing and reduce the risk of infection.

“We are collaborating with material engineers at Monash to develop novel dermal matrices which are made from natural dermal components and would enhance epidermisation both in laboratory incubators and on patients.”

The work of Dr Akbarzadeh and her team could come to full fruition with the help of the Australian Academy of Science’s Australian Early to Mid-Career Researcher Forum which has launched the Inspire Australia Video Research Competition on research crowdfunding and engagement platform, Thinkable.

With close to $15,000 in the community prize pool so far, Dr Azbarkadeh’s lab, as well as other research teams in the Thinkable community, stand to gain a share, according to their overall votes received, all going towards general funding to advance their work.

To support the work of Dr Azbarkadeh and her team, visit their Thinkable ‘Tissue engineering for burns treatment’ video page to vote and contribute. Voting ends 30 July 2015.
To find out more about how Thinkable works, visit the Thinkable.org website.

Mindfulness: a mental health technique

Dr Neil Bailey, based at the Monash Alfred Psychiatry research centre, investigates how techniques of mindfulness (or meditation) change our brain to prevent or ameliorate mental illness. Recent research has shown that the brain's grey matter is diminished in psychiatric disorders, and conserved or even augmented with mindfulness practice. Neil describes in this video the particular aspect his research is exploring.

Vote for Neil's video for the Thinkable Award. The winner is awarded $5000: Link

Monash is offering mindfulness practice courses to staff: Link