Grant: Project Grant

Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer, accounting for 1 in 8 cancer diagnoses worldwide. Triple-negative breast cancers (TNBC) make up approximately 15% of all breast cancer cases, and present significant challenges such as metastasis, resistance to therapy, and the worst outcome. Treatments that block a protein, called PDL1, that TNBC cells sometimes use to avoid being attacked by cells of the immune system has shown limited effectiveness. Recently, researchers have found that immune cells found inside TNBC tissue, called tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) can target and kill TNBC cells. However, they are not doing a good enough job because the tumor is growing. To supercharge these cells, they can be harvested from the tumor and multiplied into the billions outside of the body and then injected back into the patient to kill TNBC tumors. The main drawback of this therapy is the requirement for enough tumor tissue to expand immune cells, which excludes non-surgery patients. We can grow mini 3D breast cancers (organoids) outside of the body from biopsy samples taken from TNBC patients. We found that these 3D structures resemble the patient's cancers and can teach the patient's blood immune cells to kill their own TNBC tumors. This project will allow us to test if these easily accessible blood immune cells can kill TNBC tumors as well as TILs and to find the best way to grow organoids to fortify and expand these blood immune cells. Our goal is to provide effective immunotherapy options for a broader range of TNBC patients, especially poor outcome patients who are not eligible for surgery or are metastatic.