An international team of researchers headed up by Kantonsspital St.Gallen (the main hospital of the canton of St.Gallen) is working on a promising concept for the treatment of brain tumors. According to a press release, the science journal Nature has published the results.
The research project focused on the malignant tumor called glioblastoma, which returns despite intensive treatment. The scientists were able to detect small protein fragments in bacteria (peptides) that are presented to the immune system by brain tumors on the cell surface. As Dr. Marian Christoph Neidert, Deputy Chief Physician of the Neurosurgery Department and one of the leads of the research project, stated in the press release now it is understood that the peptides “are also recognized by the immune system and trigger an immune response to combat the tumor.”
Research is said to have known about “the relationship between the response rate to certain types of immune therapies to treat tumors and the bacterial composition of the gut flora” for years. Recently, bacteria were detected that appear inside many types of tumors, called the tumor microbiome.
The microbiome is the combination of all of the microorganisms in the human body. They have a major effect on the processes in healthy human bodies and impact illnesses.
