James P. Allison

I mean, that's what's so cool about, because then you don't need to know where to cut or know where to shine the radiation or whatever. You'd have the T cells go find it, go find the micrometastases, you know, the little clumps of tumor cell under your toenail or wherever. I mean, that's an exaggeration, obviously.

I mean, that's what's so cool about, because then you don't need to know where to cut or know where to shine the radiation or whatever. You'd have the T cells go find it, go find the micrometastases, you know, the little clumps of tumor cell under your toenail or wherever. I mean, that's an exaggeration, obviously.

But anyway, they go find the tumor cells wherever they are and take them out, or at least keep them in control where they don't grow anymore. But that process has to happen fast or the tumor wins.

But anyway, they go find the tumor cells wherever they are and take them out, or at least keep them in control where they don't grow anymore. But that process has to happen fast or the tumor wins.

so these tumors are going to grow very fast generally yeah right and and see well they not not that fast it takes years generally it's at the end when they start damaging okay but the problem i mean a lot of tumors could get quite large as long as they don't aren't in a place i mean you got a lot more degrees of freedom in a tumor that's in your abdomen than a tumor's in your brain for example just the sheer pressure in the brain will kill you

so these tumors are going to grow very fast generally yeah right and and see well they not not that fast it takes years generally it's at the end when they start damaging okay but the problem i mean a lot of tumors could get quite large as long as they don't aren't in a place i mean you got a lot more degrees of freedom in a tumor that's in your abdomen than a tumor's in your brain for example just the sheer pressure in the brain will kill you

is it is it something where different kinds of cancer are still going to need different kinds of t cells to come to life different they're all they're basically the same same kind of thing so there's commonality but it's those myeloid cells again they get in there because they can interfere in different ways so we can we've got to work on those but anyway there's this other molecule called cta4 which we just which we showed in the early 90s again was a break

is it is it something where different kinds of cancer are still going to need different kinds of t cells to come to life different they're all they're basically the same same kind of thing so there's commonality but it's those myeloid cells again they get in there because they can interfere in different ways so we can we've got to work on those but anyway there's this other molecule called cta4 which we just which we showed in the early 90s again was a break

So at the end of that expansion phase, that C2A4 molecule starts coming up and stops the T cells from dividing. They've got to stop or they'll kill you. Yeah. Because they just, you know, they got to stop. You know, I mean, it's not they don't become a cancer or something like that, but they'll just grow normally and use up all your nutrients. Yeah. Nothing left for everybody else.

So at the end of that expansion phase, that C2A4 molecule starts coming up and stops the T cells from dividing. They've got to stop or they'll kill you. Yeah. Because they just, you know, they got to stop. You know, I mean, it's not they don't become a cancer or something like that, but they'll just grow normally and use up all your nutrients. Yeah. Nothing left for everybody else.

So you've got to stop that process. And that's what this molecule called C-flav4 does. And so the thing that we figured out in the early 90s was if you block that molecule, you can let the T cells keep going a little bit longer than they would normally, long enough to take out the tumor. And then you stop the therapy and everything comes back to normal.

So you've got to stop that process. And that's what this molecule called C-flav4 does. And so the thing that we figured out in the early 90s was if you block that molecule, you can let the T cells keep going a little bit longer than they would normally, long enough to take out the tumor. And then you stop the therapy and everything comes back to normal.

And so that works spectacularly well in some kinds of cancer. just taking the brakes off for a while.

And so that works spectacularly well in some kinds of cancer. just taking the brakes off for a while.

Yeah. Melanoma kills you because it ends up in the liver or the bone or the brain. Jimmy Carter had a melanoma in his brain. He got immunotherapy. It was cured. It had to be 100 and whatever, 100. He was cured about seven years ago with immunotherapy of brain cancer.

Yeah. Melanoma kills you because it ends up in the liver or the bone or the brain. Jimmy Carter had a melanoma in his brain. He got immunotherapy. It was cured. It had to be 100 and whatever, 100. He was cured about seven years ago with immunotherapy of brain cancer.

Is it being tested? No, it's all over the world. There are millions of people, literally, that have been treated. In fact, in melanoma now, immunotherapy is pretty much the standard of care. It's the first thing you'll get because it's so effective. The drug that we developed in the late 90s, ipilimumab, that was approved by the FDA in 2011, that's given all over the world.

Is it being tested? No, it's all over the world. There are millions of people, literally, that have been treated. In fact, in melanoma now, immunotherapy is pretty much the standard of care. It's the first thing you'll get because it's so effective. The drug that we developed in the late 90s, ipilimumab, that was approved by the FDA in 2011, that's given all over the world.

As I said, millions of people have been treated. And it cures overall by itself about 20% of people with metastatic melanoma. To put this in context, melanoma was... was one of the earliest targets for several reasons, but one of which is no other drug, no drug had ever had any effect at all in melanoma, ever.

As I said, millions of people have been treated. And it cures overall by itself about 20% of people with metastatic melanoma. To put this in context, melanoma was... was one of the earliest targets for several reasons, but one of which is no other drug, no drug had ever had any effect at all in melanoma, ever.