Online event: Cancer Institute Seminar Series - Prof Ralph Weichselbaum

Hosted by: Dr Crispin Hiley

Although the success or failure of radiation therapy for cancer has long been associated with the intrinsic radio-resistance or radio-sensitivity of tumor cells, a new approach is demonstrating that radiation can take credit for an additional benefit — causing highly effective secondary immune responses that can enhance anti-tumor immunity.

In the past decade, researchers Ralph Weichselbaum and Yang Xin Fu have promoted the concept that how the host immune system interacts with therapeutic radiation is just as important as radiation itself. The cellular carnage caused by radiation attracts scavengers, such as dendritic cells. These warriors chew up radiation-damaged cancer cells and present the fragments to T cells that dismantle them. 

The Weichselbaum-Fu collaboration demonstrates how specific interactions between therapeutic radiation and a potential patient’s innate and adaptive immune responses can improve cancer treatment. 

Further information

• Non-canonical NF-κB Antagonizes STING Sensor-Mediated DNA Sensing in Radiotherapy. Immunity
• A “non-canonical” strategy may improve cancer radiotherapy. UChicago Medicine 
• Main image: credit UChiago Medicine