A modular platform for harmonized, multiplex immune profiling of MOHCCN Gold Cohorts across Canadian institutions

Over the last two decades, researchers have discovered that long-term cancer survivors often have high numbers of immune cells within their tumours. This has led them to conclude that the immune system plays an important role in combating cancer and has been the basis for the development of new therapies that harness the immune system to fight it.

Current immunotherapies are already benefiting some, but not all, patients. To make these therapies more effective and bring them to more patients, a pan-Canadian team led by experts in Halifax and Victoria will use new funding from the Terry Fox Research Institute and the Marathon of Hope Cancer Centres Network to create a standardized method to accurately map immune cells in and around tumours. This will give researchers a clearer picture of how immune cells interact with tumours and mediate therapy response in thousands of individual patients, providing necessary information to help improve the efficacy of treatments, including immunotherapies and new drugs.

“We are very grateful for this support as it will allow us to develop standardized methods to visualize, count and characterize immune cells that surround the tumour to better understand the role these cells play in various cancers,” explains Dr. Jeanette Boudreau, an immunologist at Dalhousie University, who will lead the team along with Dr. Brad Nelson at BC Cancer. “Understanding how the anti-tumour immune response relates to tumour features is crucial to design effective cancer immunotherapies.”