Immunotherapy is only effective for a small proportion of patients, and only in certain types of cancer, including melanoma and leukemia, but the experts believe the potential is huge.
"The oncologist said from this point we are not going backwards again," declared the science journal Nature.
Research begins early 80s when French researchers discovered a receptor on T cells, called CTLA-4, a molecule that turns out to play an important role in regulating the immune system.
A decade later, a Texas scientists showed that blocking CTLA-4 in mice "can release the T cells against tumor cells in animals, tumor cells shrink dramatically," wrote the journal.
Another progress followed. In the 90s, a biologist in Japan discovered a molecule on T cells that are dying, called PD-1, which also gives hope in the fight against cancer.
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Already there are 5 major pharmaceutical company who deals with immunotherapy. A new treatment from Bristol Myers-Squibb approved in 2011. His name is ipilimumab, it costs 120,000 euros each treatment program.
Expensive, and there is no guarantee of recovery. A study in 2012 of 300 people showed that the drug shrinks tumors by half or more in 31 percent of patients with melanoma, 29 percent of patients with kidney cancer, and 17 percent with lung cancer.
In 2013 released the results of research that 1,800 patients with melanoma who received ipilimumab, 22 percent were still alive three years later.
Related treatment called therapeutic artificial T cell receptors, which modify the patient's own T cells to attack the tumor and make it, has managed to bring 45 of the 75 patients in total remission toward leukemia, said the researchers involved
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One success story is Emily Whitehead, now 8 years old. In 2012 he became the first pediatric patients who received experimental therapy for acute limfoblas leukemia (ALL).
"His condition is good. Been almost 20 months now he is free of cancer. Extraordinary health. He returned as normal, school for the full time," his mother Kari tells the AFP news agency.
Emily has been practically dying, and after two times of relapse, the doctors said they had no other option. Hope they re-grow when the family learned about Emily experimental T cell therapy and intend to try it.
"There's no other option for him," said Emily's mother. "This treatment is amazing for Emily and for other families who also passed through the same treatment."
Ilmuwan top tahun 2013
The journal Nature also released a list of the best scientists in 2013.
Included in the list: meteorite hunters Russia, Viktor Grokhovsky, who for 30 years helped the progress of the study of meteor astronomers Chelyabinsk staggering when hit Earth in February 2013.
Other scientists are virologists China, Hualan Chen, who helped defuse an outbreak of H7N9 avian influenza in humans by immediately collecting samples, resulting in the closure of poultry markets are risky. The women researchers also published a controversial research about engineering the H1N1 and H5N1 hybrid flu that can be transmitted among all mammals.
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