The Immunotherapy Working Group deals with the identification of highly predictive biomarkers of response to new immunotherapeutic approaches in order to identify at an early stage those patients who are likely to benefit from treatment. In this way it is possible to avoid delivering therapies that can cause side effects while offering no clinical benefit.

The work of the WG, coordinated by Concetta Quintarelli (Bambino Gesù Pediatric Hospital in Rome) and Paola Nisticò (IRE Rome), is focused on converting non responsive patients into responsive ones through the development of new combined therapies.

Immunotherapy is an innovative therapeutic approach that uses the patient’s immune system to recognize and eliminate the cancer cells, as if it were an infection. Cancer cells are often hidden from the immune system so, in order to make them recognizable, reagents are infused into the patient to activate the immune system: antibodies and immunoglobulin that selectively recognize the cancer cell. They form a bridge between the cancer cell and the immune system and activate the latter so that it recognizes and eliminates the former.

There is an even more innovative cancer treatment that genetically modifies a Patient’s own T cells in the laboratory. Specific receptors, called chimeric antigen receptors are added to the T cells to better recognize antigens expressed by the cancer cell. These receptors are usually added to the T cell via viral vectors. Once the receptors are exposed on the cell membrane, T cells circulate like soldiers, also managing to locate metastases of the same cancer.

The focus for the future will be on creating specific, targeted therapies for each single patient, which can only be achieved through the work of a network like ACC that brings together clinical specialities and researchers from different fields.  The characterization of each individual patient will enable us to determine the correct therapy, thereby increasing benefits and at the same time reducing toxicities.