Selective evolution of cells for cancer - (Mar/14/2015 )

Hi there... 

new here... feel free to skip my intro and onto the next paragraph... I've got a degree in Psychology, minor in Englisgh. I then went onto study honours Geography and Education. I am not a biology student, and I am long finished High school.

Carl June discusses the use of T-cell/CAR-T cells here: I'll be nice and not post a link...... google "Carl june, Engineering T Cells to Conquer Cancer" .

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The reason I was searching and came across this video is that I was wondering why we don't just evolve/breed white blood cells to hunt down and kill cancer more readily....
If we could breed cells, and introduce various types of cancers, it stands to reason that the ones that survive have the strongest DNA for killing cancer... And having a various sample, couldn't one breed these cells to increase the likelihood of cancer attack? If issues of end-sample to patient arise, then do the next step of breeding cells to readily work with and be accepted by patients.

Thanks,

The-Matrix-I-Am

The simple answer to this is - the cells don't survive long enough to undergo evolution.  Cells like T-cells are end-stage differentiated and won't divide more than a few times. Cells that are capable of dividing more tend to be cancerous (i.e. leukaemia).

In addition, you would need to do this individually for each person, as other people's cells will attack the person, not just the disease (google implant rejection), and in turn be attacked by the host immune system.

There are people attempting to do exactly what you suggested, but as far as I know, it's not working yet.

it has more to do with the method of division doesn't it... Mitosis vs meiosis? 

 

No, not that I am aware of - normal cells undergo mitosis, and some of these are capable of more or less indefinite division (stem cells - common ones are in the skin, gut, and bone marrow). Some stem cells are partially differentiated, but there are cells that are capable of forming almost any tissue you care to name, with the right stimulus. It just so happens that the immune cells floating around in your blood are mostly only one or two steps away from terminal differentiation, and as that differentiation specializes them to produce an end result that doesn't rely on the cell being able to replicate (in fact many of these sorts of cells need to die once triggered by an immune response), the immune cells aren't usually capable of continued division. At least, that's my understanding of it, I'm no immunologist though.

Meiotic cells won't divide more than the once, but are derived from cells that have divided and differentiated.

see the thing that gets me is that Dr. June was able to select patient T-cells, and then reproduce/replicate them methodically. ... I thought T-cells were a from of white blood cell?