(UCLouvain press release [FR])
4/01/2023
In 2020, Sophie Lucas and her research group at the de Duve Institute succeeded in neutralizing a molecule responsible for blocking immune defenses in cancer. A clinical trial has been launched to test this new immunotherapy by combining it with another, already used but not always effective in melanoma and lung or bladder cancers. Today, the same team, and in particular Sara Lecomte and Julien Devreux, discovered that their immunotherapy is also effective against certain blood cancers, this time without having to combine it with another. Their discovery is promising because these blood cancers are difficult to treat. It is published in Blood, a high-impact journal in the field of hematology and immunology.
Years of research
This result is part of a long history of research conducted by the president of the de Duve Institute and WELBIO investigator.
An immunotherapy to combat solid and liquid cancers
Today, Sophie Lucas' group has succeeded in demonstrating that the anti-GARP antibodies developed in the laboratory are very effective against some blood cancers, often called "liquid cancers", whereas they had been developed and are being tested for "solid" cancers (bladder, lung, intestine, etc.). Moreover, the new treatment works alone in these blood cancers, without having to combine it with another immunotherapy.
For the scientists, this was an unexpected discovery. They had known for long that GARP, the molecule targeted with the antibodies, is expressed on immunosuppressive T-REG cells, but also on platelets and megakaryocytes (cells in the bone marrow that produce platelets), which are abnormally abundant in certain blood cancers.
Effective... for an unexpected reason
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Anti-GARP antibodies developed by the laboratory of Sophie Lucas are currently tested in a phase I trial to treat patients suffering from so-called “solid” cancers (cancers of the bladder, or lung, or colon … ). Recent work from the lab now shows that these antibodies could also serve to treat blood or bone marrow cancers called myeloproliferative neoplasms. Although these “liquid” cancers are usually quite difficult to treat, the anti-GARP antibodies exerted therapeutic activity in mice even when used alone (as a “monotherapy”), by acting on immune-suppressive cells called Tregs. mAb: monoclonal antibody |
Article describing this research
Therapeutic activity of GARP:TGF-β1 blockade in murine primary myelofibrosis.
Lecomte S*, Devreux J*, de Streel G, van Baren N, Havelange V, Schröder D, Vaherto N, Vanhaver C, Vanderaa C, Dupuis N, Pecquet C, Coulie PG, Constantinescu S, Lucas S.
Blood. 2022 Nov 2:blood.2022017097. doi: 10.1182/blood.2022017097
In the press
LeSoir.be - Cancer: des chercheurs de l’UCLouvain découvrent une immunothérapie prometteuse - 29/12/2022
WELRI.org - GARP dans le cancer : l'histoire continue... - 9/01/2023
EngineeringNet.be - Une immunothérapie se révèle efficace contre certains cancers du sang - 12/01/2023
RTFlash.fr- Une immunothérapie se révèle efficace contre certains cancers du sang - 14/02/2023
Aussi sur MSN.com
Funding
This work was supported by grants from the Fondation contre le Cancer, from the European Research Council (ERC), from the Actions de Recherche Concertées, from the FNRS, from the Région Wallonne and from WELBIO.
