New tool counts T cells to quickly predict cancer immunotherapy response

Scientists at University College London (UCL) and the Francis Crick Institute in London have developed a new tool that can quickly estimate the number of T cells (immune cells) in cancer tumors*; with the abundance of T cells Degrees help predict the patient’s response to immunotherapy, and researchers hope this will enable more targeted and effective cancer treatments

The TRACERx project funded by Cancer Research UK was published in the journal Nature.

Corresponding author Dr.

"Immune cells are very important for controlling cancer, affecting patient survival, and guiding treatment.

"Our goal is to explore whether a new method can be developed without more data to elucidate immune cells directly from DNA sequencing

DNA sequencing allows scientists to see the evolutionary history of how individual tumors develop

Specifically, they found a "signal" indicating the absence of T cell receptor deletion loops (TRECs) required for T cell maturation, which occurred during VDJ recombination

Dr.

"This scoring can also be applied to DNA sequencing data obtained from normal blood samples that are usually collected.

Why this will help immunotherapy

Checkpoint inhibitors (CPIs) are a type of immunotherapy, which has become a revolutionary therapy for the treatment of various cancers in recent years

CPIs work by blocking a protein called checkpoints, which are produced by T cells; these checkpoints help prevent an overly strong immune response and sometimes prevent T cells from killing cancer cells

One of the biomarkers predicting the possible success of immunotherapy is the number of T cells

The first author, Dr.

"In fact, apart from standard DNA sequencing, the process we developed does not require additional time and cost

"Our tools will also allow more research into the immune system, not just in the context of cancer

The scientists said that since the tool has only been used in research so far, they need further development before it can be used clinically

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*This tool/method can work on any sequencing data
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** VDJ recombination also occurs in B cells (in different genes)
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This method can be extended to B cells in the future
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10.
1038/s41586-021-03894-5

'Harnessing sequencing data to quantify T cell fraction and therapy response'