This month’s Journal of Immunology’s cover story features a large piece of collaborative work carried out by the University of Southampton’s Antibody and Vaccine Group within Cancer Sciences.
Dr Stephen Beers who is Associate Professor in Cancer Immunology and Immunotherapy explains the science behind the picture and why identifying special receptors on cells is key to designing better treatments to treat aggressive cancers.
“Immunotherapy with antibodies is changing the way we treat many aggressive cancers which had previously been considered fatal. Much of this success has come from a deep scientific understanding of how the bodys immune system recognises malignant cells and how antibody drugs can be used to re-awaken immune cells which have been suppressed within the microenvironment of a growing cancer.
In this latest article, the Antibody and Vaccine Group have developed unique reagents to characterise a family of receptors, called Fc receptors, which play an important part in the body’s immune system and in controlling the ability of antibody drugs to control cancer. The image produced here shows a section of human spleen where we have labeled an important inhibitory immune receptor called FcγRIIB (shown in brown) and B cells, a special type of immune cell (shown in red).
Our current research suggests that FcγRIIB is a key regulator of immune function and can often dictate the success of antibody treatment. Being able to measure and possible block its inhibitory activity provides an exciting new line of investigation for the Antibody and Vaccine Group.”
The striking front cover image was made by the University’s Stephanie Laversin, a member of Stephen Beers Cancer Sciences research team.
See the Journals front cover and link to full article here .
