UCY researchers analyse impact of gut microbiome on cancer immunotherapy

University of Cyprus researchers in collaboration with their colleagues from leading universities and medical institutions, such as Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School and the MD Anderson Cancer Center of the University of Texas have published a groundbreaking study in the prestigious scientific journal Cancer Research, of the American Association for Cancer Research on the impact of gut microbiome on cancer immunotherapy.

The study entitled 'Mathematical Modeling and Association Analysis Deciphers the Impact of the Gut Microbiome on Cancer Immunotherapy' shows a better understanding of the underlying mechanisms by which the microbiome influences immunotherapy in order to identify strategies to optimize outcomes.

The researchers said that to this end, they developed a mathematical model to obtain insights into the effect of the microbiome on the immune system and immunotherapy response.

This model, the study says, was based on gut microbiome data derived from preclinical studies, mathematical modeling of the antitumor immune response, association analysis of microbiome profiles with model-predicted immune profiles, and statistical models that correlate model parameters with the microbiome.

The model was used to investigate the complexity of murine and human studies on microbiome modulation.

The study says that comparison of model predictions with experimental observation of tumor response in the training and test datasets supported the hypothesis that two model parameters, the activation and killing rate constants of immune cells, are the most influential in tumor progression and are potentially affected by microbiome composition.

Moreover, the researchers noted that evaluation of the associations between the gut microbiome and immune profile indicated that the components and structure of the gut microbiome affect the activation and killing rate of adaptive and innate immune cells.

Overall, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of microbiome-cancer interactions and offers a framework for understanding how microbiome interactions influence cancer treatment outcomes.

(Source: CNA)