"The immune system could play a very important role in diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's or depression". So says Dr. Juan José Lasarte, director of the Immunology and Immunotherapy Program of the research center Applied Medicine (CIMA) of the University of Navarra. "Immunotherapy offers a range of therapeutic possibilities. It is achieving unprecedented results in some types of cancer such as melanoma and lung cancer, where complete and lasting cures have been achieved in a significant percentage of patients," he adds.

Experts in immunotherapy from CIMA and Navarrabiomed will talk about the latest experimental advances against cancer and other pathologies this Friday 29th, at 7 pm, at the Pamplona Planetarium. The informative talk, which will be moderated by Dr. Ruth Vera, head of Medical Oncology at the Navarra Hospital Complex, is part of the events organized on the occasion of the International Day of Immunology.

Immunology is the science that studies the mechanisms of action of the immune system and its role in health and disease. It is now known that the immune system is capable of protecting the body against the growth of tumor cells. But the mechanisms that normally protect against infections and eliminate diseased cells are also capable of causing tissue damage and autoimmune diseases, among others.

"Since the immune system is capable of attacking and eliminating infections and tumor cells, its manipulation constitutes a very important therapeutic tool . On the one hand, strategies capable of activating the immune system offer alternatives for the prevention and treatment of infections or cancer. But, on the other hand, inactivation of the immune system can be a therapeutic option in the treatment of autoimmune diseases or to avoid rejection in organ transplantation," says Dr. Lasarte.

According to Dr. David Escors, researcher principal of Navarrabiomed's Immunomodulation group , "the advantage of using the immune system as a therapeutic tool is that it can reach any part of the body, with some exceptions. Even the brain contains immune system cells. In addition, the immune system is capable of recognizing and 'respecting' that which is not harmful to the organism, the fundamental and main characteristic of our defenses".

A historical milestone of immunology in the control of infectious diseases was the development of vaccines. This is one of the greatest achievements of medicine, which since its introduction has saved millions of lives worldwide.

For the treatment of cancer, immunotherapy is not a new concept, but was seriously proposed at the beginning of the 20th century. In Dr. Escors' opinion, "the scientific effort to make it effective as a therapy has been truly enormous. During all these years this effort has taken the form of a very detailed knowledge of the basic mechanisms by which the immune system functions. Once the mechanisms used by tumors to stop the immune attack were discovered, 'biological' treatments have been developed that effectively boost the anti-tumor capabilities of our defenses".

Preclinical experiments show that the combination of immunotherapy with other conventional therapies such as chemotherapy, radiotherapy, radiofrequency or experimental vaccines can improve the results being obtained to date. Similarly, research in this field has made it possible to develop strategies for extracting immune cells with antitumor activity from the patient and culturing them in vitro to implant them back into the patient. "We have learned how to modify these cells genetically to make them more effective. There are currently more than 1,000 clinical trials of immunotherapy in different types of cancer in which these types of therapies are being combined. Undoubtedly, a very exciting time is opening up in which we hope that the results of these trials will show oncologists the guidelines for tackling different types of tumors," suggest the researchers at CIMA and Navarrabiomed, who are part of the high school de research Sanitaria de Navarra (IdisNA).