Beating blood cancers with CAR-T cells

In 10 seconds? Scientists have figured out how to use intricate cellular engineering to turn T-cells into enhanced cancer-killing machines–AKA CAR-T cells–that have been remarkably successful in treating multiple types of blood cancers.

What’s the story? In our Immunity vs. Cancer series so far, we’ve talked about how our killer T cells help attack cancer. This power has heartened scientists who are looking to enhance T cells’ killing abilities by developing new anticancer immunotherapies. It's not all that straightforward, though: T cells are intricately regulated (turned on and off) by our bodies, which keeps them from being the ideal cancer-killing weapons that researchers had hoped they would be.