Manipulating the immune response Flashcards
What is the primary goal of manipulating the immune response?
The goal is to stimulate or restore the immune system’s ability to fight infection and disease including immune-related conditions and cancers.
What are the main approaches to manipulating the immune response?
Approaches include vaccination T cell therapy antibody administration cytokines drug delivery and immunotherapy techniques.
How are T cells used in manipulating the immune response?
T cells can be enhanced via vaccination or isolated grown in the lab and reintroduced into patients through adoptive T cell transfer.
What are monoclonal antibodies and how are they used?
Monoclonal antibodies are genetically engineered identical antibodies that target specific antigens used for neutralizing disease molecules and targeting tumor cells.
What are the advantages of monoclonal antibodies in therapy?
They have high specificity well-characterized structures and are derived from normal body components making them effective in treating immune diseases infections and cancer.
What are some examples of monoclonal antibody therapies?
Anti-TNF-alpha antibodies like adalimumab are used for inflammation in conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis and skin diseases.
What are the limitations of monoclonal antibody therapies?
Limitations include high costs limited global availability and their role as treatments rather than cures.
What is adoptive T cell therapy?
Adoptive T cell therapy involves isolating patient T cells growing them in the lab and reintroducing them to target and kill tumor cells or infected cells.
What is CAR T cell therapy?
CAR T cell therapy involves engineering T cells to express a chimeric antigen receptor that combines an antibody-binding domain with T cell signaling components to target specific tumor antigens.
What are the advantages of CAR T cell therapy?
CAR T cell therapy avoids the need for isolating specific T cells instead targeting cells with identifiable surface markers using engineered T cells.
How do tumors escape immune system detection?
Tumors evade immune control through processes like reducing antigen expression mutating antigens and suppressing immune responses over time.
What are the types of tumor antigens?
Tumor antigens include viral antigens mutated self-proteins overexpressed self-proteins and differentially expressed self-proteins such as cancer testis antigens.
What is the role of vaccines in cancer immunotherapy?
Vaccines aim to induce T cell responses against tumor antigens using viral DNA RNA peptide or protein-based strategies.
What are the challenges in adoptive T cell therapy?
Challenges include isolating and expanding tumor-specific T cells in sufficient numbers and ensuring they maintain their specificity and functionality.
What are the components of CAR T cells?
CAR T cells have an engineered receptor combining an antibody variable domain for antigen binding with T cell signaling domains like CD3 zeta.
