cancer immunology

Examples of cancer immunology in the following topics:

• Cancer Immunology

  • Cancer immunology examines the interaction between cancer cells and the immune system.
  • Cancer immunology is the study of interactions between the immune system and cancer cells (also called tumors or malignancies).
  • The study of these viruses and their role in the development of various cancers is still continuing; however, a vaccine has been developed that can prevent infection of certain HPV strains, and thus prevent those HPV strains from causing cervical cancer, and possibly other cancers as well.
  • Cancer immunotherapy attempts to stimulate the immune system to reject and destroy tumors.
  • Lung cancer has been demonstrated to potentially respond to immunotherapy.

• The Future of Diagnostic Immunology

  • The future of diagnostic immunology lies in the production of specific antibody-based assays and the development of improved vaccines.
  • Modern immunology relies heavily on the use of antibodies as highly specific laboratory reagents.
  • Immunology is a relatively young science and there is still so much to discover.
  • Immunologists work in many different disease areas today that include allergy, autoimmunity, immunodeficiency, transplantation, and cancer.
  • In the cancer research field, vaccines that stimulate the immune system to attack tumor cells are undergoing clinical trials.

• Primary and Secondary Antibody Responses

  • Adaptive (or acquired) immunity creates immunological memory after an initial response to a specific pathogen, leading to an enhanced response to subsequent encounters with that same pathogen.
  • Disorders of the immune system can result in autoimmune diseases, inflammatory diseases and cancer.
  • Immunology covers the study of all aspects of the immune system.
  • In immunology, self molecules are those components of an organism's body that can be distinguished from foreign substances by the immune system.
  • Because immunological memory has developed, reinfection at later times leads to a rapid increase in antibody production and effector T cell activity.

• Overview of the Immune System

  • Macrophages begin to fuse with, and inject its toxins into, the cancer cell.
  • The cancer cell appears lumpy in the last stage before it dies.
  • These lumps are actually the macrophages fused within the cancer cell.
  • The cancer cell then loses its morphology, shrinks up and dies.
  • Because immunological memory has developed, reinfection at later times leads to a rapid increase in antibody production and effector T cell activity.

• Effects of Smoking

  • Figure 1 shows the correlation between smoking and lung cancer.
  • Among the diseases that can be caused by smoking are vascular stenosis, lung cancer, heart attacks, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
  • Tobacco use leads most commonly to diseases affecting the heart and lungs, with smoking being a major risk factor for heart attacks, strokes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (including emphysema and chronic bronchitis), and cancer (particularly lung cancer, cancers of the larynx and mouth, and pancreatic cancer).
  • The primary risks of tobacco usage include many forms of cancer, particularly lung cancer, kidney cancer, cancer of the larynx and head and neck, breast cancer, bladder cancer, cancer of the esophagus, cancer of the pancreas, and stomach cancer.
  • There is some evidence suggesting a small increased risk of myeloid leukemia, squamous cell sinonasal cancer, liver cancer, colorectal cancer, cancers of the gallbladder, the adrenal gland, the small intestine, and various childhood cancers.

• Natural Killer Cells

  • Granzymes are released along with the perforin in the immunological synapse.
  • They are an effective mechanism for controlling potential infections and preventing cancer progression.

• Increased Cancer Risk from Radiation

  • Additionally, the vast majority of non-invasive cancers are non-melanoma skin cancers caused by non-ionizing ultraviolet radiation.
  • Cancer is a stochastic effect of radiation, meaning that the probability of occurrence increases with effective radiation dose, but the severity of the cancer is independent of dose.
  • Cancer starts with a single cell whose operation is disrupted.
  • An increased risk of cancer has been shown to correlate with radiation dose.
  • Recognize the relationship between radiation exposure and one's chance of acquiring cancer

• Cervical Cancer

  • Cervical cancer is a cancer that originates in the cervix of a female.
  • One of the most common symptoms of cervical cancer is abnormal vaginal bleeding, but in some cases there may be no obvious symptoms until the cancer has progressed to an advanced stage.
  • Very rarely, cancer can arise in other types of cells in the cervix.
  • The early stages of cervical cancer may be completely asymptomatic.
  • While the pap smear is an effective screening test, confirmation of the diagnosis of cervical cancer or pre-cancer requires a biopsy of the cervix.

• Epigenetic Alterations in Cancer

  • Cancer epigenetics is the study of epigenetic modifications to the genome of cancer cells that do not involve a change in the nucleotide sequence.
  • Epigenetic alterations are as important as genetic mutations in a cell's transformation to cancer.
  • Increasingly, scientists are understanding how these epigenetic changes are altered in cancer.
  • In cancer cells, silencing genes through epigenetic mechanisms is a common occurrence.
  • Describe the role played by epigenetic alterations to gene expression in the development of cancer

• Cancer and Translational Control

  • There are many examples of translational or post-translational modifications of proteins that arise in cancer.
  • An example of how the expression of an alternative form of a protein can have dramatically different outcomes is seen in colon cancer cells.
  • However, in colon cancer cells, expression of the long form results in increased cell growth instead of cell death.
  • Clearly, the expression of the wrong protein dramatically alters cell function and contributes to the development of cancer.
  • Undoubtedly, more targeted therapies will be developed as scientists learn more about how gene expression changes can cause cancer .