In a new podcast, a doctor explains how cancer immunotherapy uses the microbiome to create an “on-off” switch for tumors.
For decades, traditional cancer treatments like chemotherapy and radiation have targeted tumors directly—often with severe side effects and mixed results.
But what if the key to treating cancer was already inside our bodies?
Professor Thomas Gajewski, a renowned oncologist at the University of Chicago, is leading a revolution by using the body’s gut microbiome to fight cancer. His pioneering work in cancer immunotherapy focuses on why some patients with melanoma responded dramatically to immune-based therapies while others do not.
In this episode of the Big Brains podcast, Gajewski discusses how training T-cells to recognize and attack tumors is transforming oncology, why the microbiome might hold the key to supercharging cancer treatments, and what it will take to make life-saving immunotherapies effective for every patient:
Read the transcript for this episode.
Source: University of Chicago
