What is the issue for NSW?
Cancer causes nearly 1 in every 7 deaths. Melanoma is a significant health problem and the most common cancer in young Australians, accounting for 75% of all skin cancer deaths. Immune checkpoint inhibitors (cancer immunotherapy) have changed cancer treatment, including for melanoma. They harness the body’s immune response against cancer. But, most patients recur or develop resistance after initial treatment. The drivers of this response are well established. Cancer immunotherapy often fails but the causes are unclear. Understanding the traits of non-responding patients could help to design better drugs and improve cancer survival rates. Finding new targets in the cancer’s vulnerabilities, and using immune control in the tumour microenvironment, will expand the benefits of immunotherapy.
What does the research aim to do and how?
Some cancer cells thrive better than others because they can avoid the immune system. This research investigates how the tumour immune microenvironment helps cancer cells evade immunotherapy. It also uncovers new cancer-specific vulnerabilities. Therapy-resistant phenotypes will be sequenced one cell at a time, therefore mapping the individual resistance clones in the tumour ecosystem. This will reveal other niches resistance mechanisms that underlie immune control and escape. This research find immune-based drug targets for patients resistant to standard immunotherapies and define the best new treatments to improve patient outcomes.