A growing cancer is shaped by more than just the tumor cells it contains; the tissue around a tumor also alters its biology. Now, researchers at The Jackson Laboratory (JAX) have combined advanced imaging techniques with a new computational method to probe how immune cells interact with each other in never-before-seen detail, revealing that the interactions between immune cells in the vicinity of breast cancer or melanoma can be used to predict immune responses to the cancers as well as patient outcomes. The new approach, led by Jeffrey Chuang, a professor at JAX and senior author of the new study, showed that the more interactions between two specific immune cell types, for instance, the longer breast cancer patients tended to survive.
The work, in collaboration with JAX professor Karolina Palucka, who is also director of the JAX Cancer Center and the Edison T. Liu Endowed Chair in cancer research , was published recently in the advanced online issue of Communications Biology. "Researchers have long suspected that better characterizing this complex community, which includes immune cells, blood vessels, and signaling molecules, could shed light on how cancers grow, spread, and respond to treatment," said Chuang.
"This new analysis lets us quantify the locations and interactions of cells and molecules in a way that has never before been possible using imaging." Immune molecules Immune cells communicate with each other by bringing critical signaling proteins to their surfaces, .