[Reading Science] Planting Immunity Inside Tumors

A new ultrasound-based therapy to awaken the "immune desert"

Cancer immunotherapy was a breakthrough, but it has been ineffective against many cancers. This is because so-called "immune deserts" form, where immune cells cannot penetrate the tumor tissue. Although drugs circulate throughout the entire body, a structural limitation in which immune responses do not actually occur inside the tumor has hindered therapeutic efficacy.

A Korean research team has now proposed a new approach that directly targets this limitation. The technology selectively activates immunity only within the tumor tissue, turning areas where immunity was barely functioning into an "immune oasis."

It is a therapy that induces antitumor immune responses by altering the immune microenvironment surrounding solid tumors. Using a thermo-responsive hydrogel and high-intensity ultrasound, it stimulates local immune responses around the tumor and reactivates immune cells. Provided by the research team.

The Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) announced that a research team led by Young Min Kim of the Center for Biomaterials and Sang Min Han of the Bionics Research Center has developed a new cancer immunotherapy technology that uses ultrasound to induce immune responses only inside tumors.

Waking up immunity inside tumors with ultrasound

The research team devised a method in which an injectable gel containing immune-activating substances is directly injected into the tumor tissue, followed by application of ultrasound from outside the body. They designed the system so that only in the area reached by the ultrasound the tumor tissue is physically disrupted and tumor antigens are released, while at the same time the gel is converted into nanoscale immune-stimulating particles that immune cells can easily take up.

As a result, immune stimulation is precisely concentrated only at the tumor site. This structure reduces the likelihood of side effects caused by immune adjuvants spreading systemically as in conventional approaches, while enabling a strong immune response inside the tumor. The research team described this concept as a treatment strategy that creates a small "Immunoasis" within the tumor.

Twice as many immune cells...enhancing the effect of existing immunotherapies

In animal experiments, tumor tissues treated with this technology showed a clear increase in immune cells that attack cancer. The number of T cells, which are central to immune responses, more than doubled compared with existing treatments, and tumors that had shown almost no immune response were observed to convert into an immune-activated environment.

As a result, tumor growth was suppressed and survival time increased by about 30%. When combined with existing cancer immunotherapy drugs, the therapeutic effect increased even further, suggesting its potential as an adjuvant treatment strategy to improve response rates in cancers that previously responded poorly to immunotherapy.

Advanced Materials back cover image. Provided by Advanced Materials

This technology is also significant in that treatment is possible using only injections and ultrasound. It can be applied in a relatively simple manner even for patients for whom surgery is highly burdensome or access to treatment is difficult, and once the gel is injected, the intensity and timing of ultrasound can be adjusted to tailor treatment to the patient's condition. The research team expects that this technology could evolve into a new cancer treatment platform integrated with ultrasound equipment in the future.

Young Min Kim, a researcher at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology, said, "The core of this study is transforming the interior of tumor tissue, where immunity was barely functioning, into a space where immunity comes back to life," adding, "We hope this will lead to a new cancer immunotherapy strategy that reduces the burden on patients while enhancing the effectiveness of existing cancer immunotherapy drugs."

This research was carried out with support from the Ministry of Science and ICT, and the results were published in the international journal Advanced Materials.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.