Deactivating cancer cell gene boosts immunotherapy for head and neck cancers

By targeting an enzyme that plays a key role in head and neck cancer cells, researchers from theUCLA School of Dentistry were able to significantly slow the growth and spread of tumors in mice and enhance the effectiveness of an immunotherapy to which these types of cancers often become resistant.Their findings,  published online in the journal Molecular Cell, could help researchers develop more refined approaches to combatting highly invasive head and neck squamous cell cancers, which primarily affect the mouth, nose and throat.Immunotherapy, which is used as a clinical treatment for various cancers, harnesses the body ’s natural defenses to combat disease. Yet some cancers, including head and neck squamous cell carcinomas, don’t respond as well to the therapy as others do. The prognosis for these head and neck cancers is poor, with a high five-year mortality rate, and there is an urgent need for effective tre atments.The UCLA research team, led by distinguished professor Dr. Cun-Yu Wang, chair of oral biology at the dentistry school, demonstrated that by targeting a vulnerability in the cellular process of tumor duplication and immunity, they could affect tumor cells ’ response to immunotherapy.The enzyme they focused on, KDM4A, is what is known as an epigenetic factor — a molecule that regulates gene expression, silencing some genes in cells and activating others. In squamous cell head and neck cancers, overexpression of KDM4A promotes gene expression associated ...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news