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T cells engineered to home in on brain cancer

Immunotherapies activate T cells to destroy tumours, but the approach has failed in some brain cancers. A strategy to improve migration of T cells across the blood–brain barrier could overcome this limitation.
  1. Michael Platten

    1. Michael Platten is in the Department of Neurology, Heidelberg University, Medical Faculty Mannheim and German Cancer Research Center, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany.

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Therapies that activate immune cells called T cells to target tumours are an efficient way to combat many types of cancer1. But an aggressive brain cancer called glioblastoma has proved a particular challenge for immunotherapies2. The blood–brain barrier protects the brain against immune-cell infiltration to prevent the potentially life-threatening effects of brain inflammation. This phenomenon is beneficial in normal circumstances, but it prevents T cells from reaching glioblastomas, making the tumours immunologically ‘cold’3. In a paper in Nature, Samaha and colleagues4 report a way to trigger infiltration of T cells into the brains of mice, thus making glioblastomas vulnerable to immunotherapy.

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Nature 561, 319-320 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-05883-7

Updates & Corrections

  • Correction 08 March 2019: In view of the fact that the authors of ‘A homing system targets therapeutic T cells to brain cancer’ (H. Samaha et al. Nature 561, 331–337; 2018) are retracting their report, Michael Platten wishes to retract the News & Views article ‘T cells engineered to home in on brain cancer’ (M. Patten Nature 561, 319–320; 2018), which dealt with this study and was based on the accuracy and reproducibility of their data.

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