Zachary Schug, PhD

Cancer treatments that use the power of the human immune system have greatly improved survival for many cancer patients around the world. However, these treatments have not helped most people with breast cancer. One reason is that the environment inside breast tumors is very harsh. Because of this, the body’s normal white blood cells have trouble surviving and working properly in these tumors. As a result, the immune system cannot fight the cancer as well as it should. There is a critical need to find treatments that can change these conditions and allow the immune system to do its job. Our research has found a new way to do this. Our approach slows the growth of breast cancer, increases the activity of helpful immune cells, and reduces the activity of harmful immune cells. In this project, we will study how this process works in more detail. We will also test whether our approach works even better when combined with newer breast cancer treatments. Our goal is to learn how to use this strategy to improve treatment for patients. We believe our findings could quickly help guide new ways to treat breast cancer and, in the long run, improve the survival of breast cancer patients, including those with metastatic disease.