Glioblastoma (GBM), an aggressive brain cancer, is notoriously resistant to treatment, with recurrent GBM associated with survival of less than 10 months. Immunotherapies, which mobilize the body’s immune defenses against a cancer, have not been effective for GBM, in part because the tumor’s surrounding environment is largely impenetrable to assaults from the body’s immune system. To convert this immunosuppressive environment into one amenable to an immune response, investigators engineered a novel oncolytic virus that can infect cancer cells and stimulate an anti-tumor immune response. Results demonstrated the safety and preliminary efficacy of the novel gene therapy approach in high-grade glioma patients, with prolonged survival in a subgroup of recurrent GBM patients immunologically ‘familiar’ with the virus.
Researchers design gene therapy that can effectively target glioblastoma
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