14 DAY TRIAL // A report published in yesterday's issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences details a series of experiments during which researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine in California, US, tricked aggressive leukemia cells into becoming harmless immune cells.
Better yet, the scientists who conducted this investigation have reasons to believe that, having taken the form of immune cells, the leukemia cells they toyed with had the potential to help fight cancer, maybe even several other pathogens.
The experiments were carried out in laboratory conditions. Even so, their outcome brings new hope to leukemia sufferers. This is because, were scientists to find a way to replicate their work in patients, this would mean being able to treat leukemia by convincing the disease to take arms against itself.
Inducing a personality crisis in leukemia cells
As detailed in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, it was quite by chance that the Stanford University School of Medicine team discovered that aggressive leukemia cells can be compelled to go through an identity crisis and come out looking and behaving like immune cells.
The researchers say that, while doing their best to keep a batch of leukemia cells collected from a patient alive, they noticed that, under the influence of the environment created to safeguard and nurture them, some started turning into immune cells known as macrophages.
At first, the scientists had no idea why this was happening. Eventually, they figured out that it was because of very specific proteins present in the lab-made environment the leukemia cells were kept in. This proteins triggered the transformation by binding to certain DNA sequences in the cancer cells.
The Stanford University School of Medicine specialists say that, as odd as this may sound, it actually makes sense for leukemia cells to have the potential to turn into immune system cells. This is because leukemia cells are essentially not fully developed and, therefore, abnormal white blood cells.
How cancer could help fight cancer
Some time ago, one other team of scientists experimenting on mice showed that it is possible to turn leukemia cells into immune cells able to track down and fight cancer. If this is also true about human leukemia cells, the find could easily lead to the development of new treatment options for this disease.
“Because the macrophage cells came from the cancer cells, they will already carry with them the chemical signals that will identify the cancer cells, making an immune attack against the cancer more likely,” study senior author Ravi Majeti explained in a statement.
The Stanford University School of Medicine team plan to further investigate the possibility of turning leukemia cells into immune system cells. The goal is to find a drug that would trigger this shift and see whether the resulting immune system cells could turns against their former mates.