A personalized vaccine for glioblastoma – the most aggressive and fatal type of brain cancer – has extended the survival of four humans in the first clinical trial of its kind.
The newly fashioned medicine works by supplying the immune system with a way to 'recognize' the tumor and an 'instruction manual' for its entire transcriptome. This reveals where each and every gene in the tumor can be turned on or off.
Equipped with such vital information, the immune system can reprogram the cancer's defenses and launch a more successful attack.