FFBW-Funded Research Identifies a Promising Treatment Approach for Pancreatic Cancer

Research recently published in The Journal for Immunotherapy of Cancer and supported by the FFBW has discovered a promising potential approach for the treatment of pancreatic cancer.

The study demonstrated that pre-existing cytomegalovirus — a common virus that infects over half of adults by age 40 — infection can be leveraged to redirect immune CMV-specific T-cells to tumor cells. Systemic injection of T-cell peptide epitopes in mice resulted in delayed tumor growth, increased survival, and the modulation of the tumor microenvironment.

This research identified a tumor-agnostic treatment approach that can leverage CMV’s broad prevalence to potentially treat a variety of cancers.

This publication is the culmination of a five-year collaboration between the FFBW and Dr. Tatiana Hurtado de Mendoza at the University of California San Diego. The study, in its entirety, can be read here.