Grant: Project Grant

Immunotherapy is a life-saving alternative way to treat cancer. One particular type of treatment called chimeric antigen receptor T (CAR-T) cell therapy has produced impressive long-lasting responses in late-stage blood cancers. Despite this exciting advance, there are currently no FDA or Health Canada approvals for treating ovarian cancer with immunotherapy. Naturally, researchers are trying to answer the fundamental question: Why are ovarian cancers refractory to immunotherapy? Like all cells, immune cells must have a proper supply of nutrients to function. Researchers have found that cancer cells can cut off the supply nutrients or make certain nutrients that disable the immune fighting properties of CAR-T cells. This is an exciting proposition because it presents an opportunity to use breakthrough genetic engineering technology to make CAR-T cells more 'nutritionally fit' and rigorous in destroying tumors. However, we need to know what nutrients to consider for CAR-T cell engineering as this remains a black box. In this Project Grant, we plan to map out the nutrients involved in blocking the critical cancer-fighting properties of CAR-T cells using a specialized technology called 13C metabolite tracing. The knowledge gained from our work will be an essential step to allow us to create a translation path to use CAR-T cells to more effectively treat patients with ovarian cancer.