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What Exactly Is Cancer Immunotherapy?
The Nobel Prize was awarded this week for scientists’ contributions to the cancer treatment
Cancer immunotherapy is in the spotlight this week after two scientists won the Nobel Prize on Monday for their contributions to the treatment.
The 2018 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded jointly to James Allison, chair of the department of immunology at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Texas, and Tasuku Honjo, a distinguished professor at the Kyoto University Institute for Advanced Study in Japan, for their discoveries that lead to a new type of cancer treatment that targets people’s immune systems. The treatment, called immunotherapy, takes the brakes off the body’s main defense mechanism, a type of white blood cell known as a T-cell. Unrestricted T-cells can attack tumor cells more effectively and eradicate cancer from the body.
“Allison and Honjo showed how different strategies for inhibiting the brakes on the immune system can be used in the treatment of cancer,” the Nobel Assembly said in a statement. “The seminal discoveries by the two Laureates constitute a landmark in our fight against cancer.”
