More than 150 million women worldwide use oral contraceptives to avoid unwanted pregnancies. However, a bombshell study released by researchers at the University of Oxford has now laid bare the risks involved. The study has reportedly established the link between the usage of progestogen and the increased risk of breast cancer.

Scientists from German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), together with colleagues from Germany, Israel, and the U.S., have found that the gut microbiome may modulate the efficacy of CAR-T cellular immunotherapy CAR-T cells in patients with B cell lymphomas. Individualized microbiome information retrieved from patients’ gut microbiomes prior to initiation of CAR T therapy could accurately predict their subsequent responsiveness to therapy, but only in the condition that these patients were not pre-treated with broad spectrum antibiotics.

Increasing evidence from human studies and preclinical experiments suggests that the gut microbiome may modulate the efficacy of T cell-driven cancer immunotherapies, such as immune checkpoint blockade. Immunotherapy with CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cell has opened up new treatment options for patients with certain forms of refractory and relapsing B-cell leukemias or lymphomas. But the therapy is hampered by considerable heterogeneity in responses. Complete and long-term remission is only achieved in up to 40% of patients.

Researchers from multiple centers in Germany and the United States, led by Eran Elinav, director of the DKFZ-Weizmann Institute of Science Microbiome & Cancer Bridging division, have found that the gut microbiome may modulate the efficacy of CD19 CAR-T cell immunotherapy in patients with B cell leukemias and lymphomas.

Researchers have shown for the first time exactly how immature neutrophils—white blood cells that are an important part of the immune system—are hijacked by pancreatic cancers to drive immunosuppression and treatment resistance. The study, led by investigators at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, is published in Cancer Discovery, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

The paper describes a previously unrecognized signaling circuit in pancreatic cancer that instigates immunosuppression and tumor-promoting inflammation in the pancreatic tumor microenvironment, ultimately creating treatment resistance. The central regulator of this treatment resistance is neutrophil-derived TNF signaling. TNF, or tumor necrosis factor, is a substance in the body that causes inflammation.

This is the first study to implicate immunosuppressive signaling from immature neutrophils—the earliest sentinels in developing pancreatic cancer—in this process, said Jashodeep Datta, M.D., associate director of Translational Research at the Sylvester Pancreatic Cancer Research Institute. Datta, whose laboratory at Sylvester led the research, is senior author of the multicenter study.

And just in time for the “Last of Us” series. 😂

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A drug-resistant fungus Candida Auris is spreading in US hospitals at an alarming rate. Those with fragile immune systems are at risk. What happens if it enters your country or your neighbourhood? Should you be scared? Molly Gambhir reports.

#Gravitas #CandidaAuris #Fungus.

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