Background of Immunotherapy

Medicine has existed since the ancient civilizations of Egypt, China, and India. However, it mostly appeared in the form of crude surgeries or medicinal herbs. There is evidence from as early as 430 B.C. that if a person survived a disease, they would become “immune” to future exposure, although no one knew why. Until the transition to germ theory in the late 1850’s, people believed that disease and infection was caused by problems with the body fluids. In 1796, Edward Jenner conducted pioneering research in the field of vaccines and immunity. Later in the 19th century, William Bradley Coley, father of Immunotherapy, realized that inducing activity of the immune system helps treat diseases, and could even effectively treat cancer. Thus, the field of Immunotherapy began, developing into the various branches existing today.

Immune checkpoint therapy -helps cancer fighting immune cells, also called T-cells, attack cancer cells
Adoptive cellular therapy - increases the efficacy of immune cells, usually T cells to enhance the immune response against the cancer. There are three main types of adoptive cellular therapy
- Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cell therapy - genetically engineered T cells are used to identify and fight cancer
- Tumor infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) therapy - T cells collected from a patient’s tumor are isolated and increased in numbers in the lab and give back to the patient to fight cancer
- Endogenous T-cell (ETC) therapy - T cells are collected from patient’s blood, and after selecting the T cells that are able to recognize signatures specific to cancer are given back to the patient
Cancer vaccines - agents that recognize cancer cells and when given to the patient enhance the immune system to fight them. Vaccines are usually derived from cancer cells from the patient’s tumor, proteins that are designed to attach to cancer cells or proteins specific to the patient’s tumor
Monoclonal antibodies - proteins that attach to specific proteins (called antigens) on the surface of cancer cells or immune cells to enhance the immune response to destroy the cancer
Cytokine therapy - use of proteins called interferons and interleukins to trigger an immune response. The cytokines treatments are also combined with other types of immunotherapies to enhance efficacy.