The internal Security service saves from blood cancer
The immune system protects itself from cancer
Of course, the cell has molecular mechanisms that allow you to quickly fix DNA damage. But, nevertheless, if we take, for example, oncological diseases of the blood, then their frequency still turns out to be less than one might assume.
The precursors of B cells during maturation often undergo malignant degeneration, which could lead to full-fledged lymphoma. In fact, each of us regularly receives such a mutation that could trigger the development of this blood cancer. But this is not happening. Why?
And all because of the additional protection system built into the immunity itself, which is described in the journal Nature Medicine by Axel Kallies and his colleagues from the Australian Institute of Medical Research Walter and Eliza Hall (Afshar-Sterle et al., Fas ligand–mediated immune surveillance by T cells is essential for the control of spontaneous B cell lymphomas).
Scientists experimented with maturing B cells (which, recall, are engaged in the synthesis of antibodies), trying to understand under what conditions they become malignant. At some point, it occurred to them to weaken the work of T cells, and as soon as they did, the lymphoma rapidly began to grow.
That is, despite the frequent mutations that get into the oncogenes of B cells, thanks to T cells, cancer still does not reach. According to scientists, if T cells did not work, the development of lymphoma would take not years, as usual, but only a few weeks. Of course, cancer surveillance is a well–known function of immunity, but in this case it was a surprise how intensively and effectively this system works.
In fact, T cells have to clean out potentially cancerous B cells every day, otherwise we would all have had blood cancer for a long time.
T-cell (left) and B-cell (photo by Dennis Kunkel Microscopy, Inc.).
Although the experiments were performed on animals, most likely, the same anti-cancer system is built into the human immune system. Obviously, if the disease does develop, it means that B cells have managed to escape from T-cell protection. So, for effective therapy, you need to learn how to target such cells and destroy them – either directly with the help of drugs, or by stimulating all the same T-cells.
Prepared based on the materials of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research:
Red alert: body kills ‘spontaneous’ blood cancers on a daily basis.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru04.02.2014