Immunotherapy has become a go-to weapon in many oncologists’ cancer-fighting arsenals. But even rallying hordes of immune cells are no match for brain cancers such as glioma. Potent immunotherapies, including immune checkpoint inhibition, end up sidelined during the treatment of these wily tumors that often claim patients’ lives in just over one year.1
Recent work proposes a way to help immune cells penetrate gliomas’ defenses. “This was the most challenging cancer to work with,” said Crismita Dmello, a neuroscientist at Northwestern University and lead author of the study. “But we decided to go for it.” In a study published in Nature Communications, her team reported that blocking a signaling molecule called Chek2 may make immune checkpoint inhibition better at destroying gliomas.2
Previous work from the team showed that the level of signaling molecules called kinases is linked to how well patients respond to immune checkpoint inhibition.3 But with over 700 ...
