Beating brain cancer through vaccines and research
When Jamil Newirth was 32, doctors told him he had terminal brain cancer and about 17 months to live. Today, at 45, the Hawaii native is thriving 鈥� thanks to a groundbreaking glioblastoma vaccine developed at 芭乐视频
Across the university, surgeons and scientists are rethinking how to fight brain cancers, particularly glioblastoma, the most aggressive and deadly form of brain cancer. Among them are Linda Liau and Aparna Bhaduri, two researchers at 芭乐视频 Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center leading bold new approaches aimed at giving patients like Newirth something once thought impossible: time.
Liau, chair of the neurosurgery department at the David Geffen School of Medicine at 芭乐视频 and director of 芭乐视频鈥檚 NCI-funded Brain Tumor SPORE (Specialized Program of Oncologic Research Excellence), has spent decades turning the immune system into a weapon against brain tumors. Supported in part by the National Institutes of Health, her research led to the development of DCVax-L, a personalized vaccine that has given new hope to patients facing a devastating diagnosis.
The science behind the vaccine is surprisingly elegant. Liau and her team found that by taking a patient鈥檚 own immune cells, exposing them in the lab to pieces of that person鈥檚 glioblastoma tumor, and then injecting them back into the patient, the immune system could be 鈥渢aught鈥� to recognize and attack the cancer. Over a series of clinical trials, DCVax-L was shown to help extend the lives of people with newly diagnosed and recurrent glioblastoma 鈥� with some surviving far beyond the expected two-year expected survival for this diagnosis.
鈥淭here is a significant subgroup of patients who have lived more than five years,鈥� Liau says. 鈥淏ut the challenge is trying to determine which patients it may work for and for which patients it doesn鈥檛. Each new discovery gets us closer to improving survival and quality of life for patients facing this devastating disease.鈥�
DCVax-L potentially represents one of the first successful brain cancer vaccines and a milestone in the field of cancer immunotherapy.
While Liau鈥檚 work trains the immune system to fight back, Aparna Bhaduri, an assistant professor of medicine and biological chemistry and member of the 芭乐视频 Broad Stem Cell Research Center, is using stem cell technology to uncover how glioblastoma grows, adapts and resists treatment. Her lab builds 3D tumor-immune organoid models 鈥� miniature, stem cell-derived brain tissues implanted with patient tumor samples 鈥� to recreate and study the complexity of the human brain and its tumor environment.
These all-human models allow Bhaduri鈥檚 team to observe how tumor, brain and immune cells interact in real time, revealing how glioblastoma communicates with its surroundings and evolves to evade treatment. The system closely mirrors the complexity of the human brain 鈥� something that traditional mouse models can鈥檛 fully capture 鈥� giving researchers a clearer picture of what drives tumor growth and why many current therapies fall short.
Bhaduri鈥檚 group is using this platform to test combinations of existing drugs and identify strategies that could more effectively target the diverse cell populations within a tumor. The ultimate goal, she says, is to lay the groundwork for more personalized and effective treatments for glioblastoma.
鈥淲e now have tools that let us study the human brain鈥檚 complexity and how cancer exploits it in ways we couldn鈥檛 before,鈥� Bhaduri says. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 what makes this work so exciting 鈥� it moves us closer to understanding how these tumors behave and how we can finally change the outcome for patients.鈥�