Cancer remains one of the most challenging diseases to successfully treat. Amongst the most promising new approaches for targeting cancer is harnessing the power of the immune system to fight cancer. However, cancer has developed many ways of evading and suppressing the immune system. One such mechanism is to starve the attacking immune system of key nutrients. In my proposal, I aim to investigate a new subset of the immune system emerging as a potential immunotherapy, the MAIT cell. Many studies have shown the MAIT cell to be enriched in the tumours of patients with cancer, but unfortunately, they seem to be suppressed in their anti-cancer activity. I propose that low nutrient levels (specifically amino acids) are the reason that MAIT cells are defective in cancer and aim to answer this question in my summer project. Understanding why MAIT cells are defective will potentially allow us to find new ways of reinvigorating their anti-cancer fighting ability.
