University of Alberta medical researchers have discovered how the human immune system kills healthy cells as it attacks infected cells. Photo: University of Alberta.
Researchers hope to learn how to instruct immune system to kill only malignant cells
By Raquel Maurier
Better treatments for cancer and viral infections may soon be possible after Canadian medical scientists discover how the immune system kills healthy cells while attacking infections.
Dr. Colin Anderson. Photo: University of Alberta.
Colin Anderson, a researcher with the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry, recently published his team’s findings in the peer-reviewed Journal of Immunology. His team included colleagues from the United States and the Netherlands, and graduate students from the U of A. The research was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.
Previous research has shown that when the immune system launches an aggressive attack on infected cells, healthy tissues and cells can be killed or damaged in the process. Anderson and his team discovered the mechanisms in the immune system that cause this “overkill” response.
“This opens the opportunity that one might be able to manipulate the immune-system response to block collateral damage without blocking the killing of infected cells,” said Anderson, who received his doctorate from the University of Western Ontario and completed post-doctoral training in France and the United States.
“In the future, this might be important in the development of clinical treatments in cases where the immune system response needs to be harnessed. For example, in treating various viral infections, the collateral damage caused during the immune-system attack is a large part of the illness.
Anderson says that in some cases, such as cancer or tumour treatments, doctors may want to increase the immune system’s ability to kill collateral cells, in hopes of killing tumour cells that would otherwise escape during treatment and spread elsewhere in the body.
“Our research suggests there are other mechanisms that could improve cancer therapy and make it more efficacious,” he said. “This finding could also help us understand why certain cancer treatments are more successful than others.”
Anderson’s team discovered that “the weaponry” the immune system uses to try to kill an infected or cancerous cell is not exactly the same as the weaponry that causes collateral damage to innocent bystander cells that aren’t infected.
For years, it was assumed the weaponry to kill infected cells versus healthy cells was exactly the same.
Anderson says, the research group is continuing work in this area to see whether it can alter the level of collateral damage to healthy cells without altering the attack on infected cells.
Anderson is a researcher in the Department of Surgery and the Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology. He is also a member of the Alberta Diabetes Institute and the Alberta Transplant Institute.
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