Researchers find that cord blood T cells are more efficient in killing cancer cells than T cells from peripheral blood.
It is a common practice now for obstetricians to provide expectant mothers with information on cord blood banking. New evidence is emerging every day that cord blood possesses many superior qualities. Even after being done with its main job of nourishing a baby, it is found by scientists to help in many diseases, particularly cancer therapy.
In Part I of this series we introduced T cell based immunotherapy and in Part II we discussed how chimeric antigen receptors (CARs) expressing T cells can be even more potent. In Part III below, we expand this concept further by covering hematopoetic stem cells and additional ways they can be engineered for promising immunotherapy of cancer and leukemia.
In the first part of this series we introduced the concept of cell-based immunotherapy with T cell transplants. Next, we describe an even more potent approach to cancer treatment with T cells that are engineered to express anti-tumor molecules or cell surface tumor-identifying killer receptors. The latter of which are called chimeric antigen receptors, or CARs.