The scientific journal Cancer Research has published a study by researchers at the Center for Applied Medical Research (CIMA) and the Clínica Universidad de Navarra which identifies a new target for cancer treatment in the vascular cells. This is a complex finding which Dr. Ignacio Melero compares to "a key to open the doors of the tumor to the immune system".

As he explains, they have discovered "a new mechanism by which antibodies act against the tumor receptor CD137, the activity of which was previously only known in relation to the cells of the immune system itself. The blood vessels of the tumor have been observed to have the receptor CD137, unlike the blood vessels in the rest of the organism. This is because of the hypoxia (low oxygen concentration) in the tumor tissues. When the CD137 receptor is triggered in the capillaries, a series of mechanisms is set off which makes it easier for the effector cells (cells which execute the response) of the immune system to enter and potentially to destroy the tumor. By stimulating CD137, on the one hand we can heighten the immune response, and on the other, we can make it easier for lymphocytes that can combat the tumor to get inside, by "opening the doors" of the malignant tissue."

These results, which were obtained in collaboration with the pharmaceutical corporation Bristol Myers Squibb in Princeton (USA), is important for the progress of the clinical trials (currently phase I/II) which this company is carrying out with a monoclonal antibody that activates CD137 in patients with melanoma and other types of cancer.