Understanding the interaction between the immune system and cancer to enhance patient outcomes

How can we use the body’s immune system to prevent and treat cancer?

Adoptive cellular therapy. Cancer vaccines. Oncolytic viral therapy. Immune response modifiers. These are several prominent examples of how Roswell Park’s Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy Program is harnessing the power of the immune system as a novel weapon in the battle against cancer.

It is now clear that traditional cancer therapies, such as radiotherapy and chemotherapy, used to fight advanced or metastatic disease, are not enough to further prolong patient survival or enhance their quality of life. Therefore, newer therapeutic interventions are necessary to meet these critical clinical challenges. With a singular focus, the scientific and clinical research activities in Roswell Park’s Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy Program have pursued a different path, one that involves developing safe and effective immune-directed therapies, known as immunotherapy.  These therapies attack cancer in a very different way – by using a patient's own immune system as the drug of choice.

Our multidisciplinary team of scientists and clinicians are world-class experts in nearly every field of oncology, and work alongside experts in biostatistics and bioinformatics, flow and image cytometry, vector production, to name a few, so we can develop, test and analyze the efficacy of these novel immunotherapies.

Program leaders

Emese Zsiros, MD, PhD, FACOG
2023 Buffalo Spree Top Doctors Badge
"My passion for successfully treating my gynecologic patients’ cancer is driven by the hope and optimism I see when they come to Roswell Park and knowing I can provide them with traditional care combined with the newest advancements science has to offer. It is a privilege to walk beside these patients and their caregivers supporting them as they navigate this part of their life’s journey."
Emese Zsiros, MD, PhD, FACOG
Associate Professor of Oncology
Chair, Department of Gynecologic Oncology
Director of Research, Department of Gynecologic Oncology
Associate Program Director, Fellowships in Gynecologic Oncology
Department of Translational Immuno-Oncology
Shashi Lele, MD, Endowed Chair in Gynecologic Oncology
Co-Leader, Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy CCSG Program
Read more about Dr. Zsiros
Meet the program members

Program goals

The Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy Program at Roswell Park seeks to understand and decipher the complex relationship between the immune system and malignancy and to translate this fundamental knowledge into the development of novel diagnostic, preventive, and treatment paradigms.

Our research focuses on three key areas:

Close up of a microscope and slide

Tumor-immune interactions within its microenvironment

Loading a machine for immune analyis

Immune-mediated mechanisms of tumor regression

Department of Immunotherapy

Immunotherapies for clinical cancer care and control

These themes are dynamic and interactive, continually evolving to translate basic science discoveries to clinical application.

Bench-to-bedside collaboration

Taking advantage of the close collaborations among our scientists, our program relies on the validation of results from in vitro systems to in vivo preclinical or animal models.

The information derived from these in vitro and in vivo studies is then utilized to develop novel immune-based strategies, which may be used alone or combined with other conventional or experimental agents, to address important clinical questions. In turn, the answers generated in the clinical setting raise new questions that necessitate a return to the laboratory for detailed preclinical follow-up and testing.

This bi-directional exchange of information between laboratory and clinical investigators provides the opportunity to apply basic science and the underlying molecular mechanisms to clinically relevant questions.

Dr. Brentjens sitting at a desk in his lab

Spotlight: CAR T-cell therapy: looking back and looking forward

Recent progress indicates a considerably improved mechanistic understanding of CAR T-cell biology and delivers important insights into why some patients achieve durable remissions and others do not.

Read the latest study by Renier Brentjens, MD, PhD and Marco Davila, MD, PhD

See the science Meet Dr. Brentjens Meet Dr. Davila

Clinical trials

SurVaxM

Trial #: NCT02455557
Principal Investigators: Robert Fenstermaker, MD, and Michael Ciesielski, PhD

Drs. Fenstermaker and Ciesielski, creators of SurVaxM

SurVaxM was discovered, developed, and clinically translated entirely at Roswell Park. Drs. Fenstermaker and Ciesielski and colleagues have developed therapeutic vaccines against survivin, a non-mutated protein that is overexpressed in glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) and multiple types of other aggressive cancers as a novel anti-cancer agent.

Termed SurVaxM, this vaccine is a first-in-class immunogen targeting survivin. The vaccine acts by inducing antitumor immune responses. A Phase II trial (NCT02455557) of SurVaxM with standard-of-care chemo-radiation in newly diagnosed GBM is now complete and recently published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

Of the 63 patients evaluable for outcome, 60 (95.2%) remained progression-free 6 months after diagnosis (pre-specified primary end point). Median progression-free survival was 11.4 months and median overall survival was 25.9 months. Additional clinical trials led by this team involving this cancer vaccine are ongoing, both in GBM (NCT05163080, NCT04013672) and other cancer types, including multiple myeloma (NCT02334865) or neuroendocrine tumors (NCT03879694).

Read more about SurVaxM

Tivozanib

Trial #: NCT01835223
Principal Investigator: Yasmin Thanavala, PhD

Yasmin Thanavala, PhD

Dr. Thanavala and colleagues have continued their efforts to understand immune dysfunction in patients with advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Their earlier work demonstrated that treatment of HCC patients with sorafenib (a tyrosine kinase inhibitor) reduced the extent of immune suppression caused by regulatory T cells (Tregs), which was associated with increased overall survival.

Her team has extended this work to a newer generation of a more potent kinase inhibitor, termed Tivozanib and evaluated its impact on Tregs, as part of a Phase Ib/II trial (NCT01835223).

Meet Dr. Thanavala

More clinical trials

Dr. Pawel Kalinski

NCI Award #: 1P01CA234212-01
Principal Investigator: Pawel Kalinski, MD, PhD

This P01, a major program project grant, includes five Phase I/II trials, which will test the impact of novel combination regimens on reshaping the tumor microenvironment (TME) to facilitate the infiltration of tumor-specific cytotoxic T lymphocytes, thus potentially improving patient outcome to immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy (i.e., PD-1 blockade).

Meet Dr. Kalinski Read the research

Sarbajit Mukherjee, MD, MS

Trial #: NCT03403634
Principal Investigator: Sarbajit Mukherjee, MD

This Phase IIA trial studies the combinatorial efficacy of celecoxib, recombinant interferon alpha-2b, and rintatolimod in treating patients with colorectal cancer that has spread to the liver.

Celecoxib is thought to inhibit the growth of tumor cells by blocking a key enzyme for cell growth, as well as the immune suppressive function of myeloid populations within the TME. Recombinant interferon alpha-2b is a protein that can improve the body's innate immune response and may also interfere with the growth of tumor cells. Rintatolimod also acts as an immune agonist, albeit differently, to stimulate the innate immune system.

Meet Dr. Mukherjee

Research highlights

Roswell Park has a long history of discovery in tumor immunology, and we’re unique in that each faculty’s research program has a major focus on cancer and tumor immunology.

Figure from a scientific research study

Postoperative Restrictive Opioid Protocols and Durable Changes in Opioid Prescribing and Chronic Opioid Use

Read the press releaseSee the science

Figure from a scientific research study

Inhibiting the biogenesis of myeloid-derived suppressor cells enhances immunotherapy efficacy against mammary tumor progression

Read the press releaseSee the science

Figure from a scientific research study

Mitigating the prevalence and function of myeloid-derived suppressor cells by redirecting myeloid differentiation using a novel immune modulator

Read the press releaseSee the science

Figure from a scientific research study

GPRC5D-Targeted CAR T Cells for Myeloma

Read the press releaseSee the science

Recent publications

Education & training

In addition to our research and clinical trials, we are also committed to training the next generation of basic and clinical scientists, who will lead the fight against cancer.

Trainees in Roswell Park’s Tumor Immunology PhD track study closely with program members and participate in all phases of basic and translational research.

Education at Roswell Park
Patient with a loved one looking out the window

Spotlight: Division of Translational Immuno-Oncology

Roswell Park is one of the first institutions in the nation to establish a Division of Translational Immuno-Oncology with state-of-the-art facilities and research laboratories.

This combination of core facilities and partnerships with academic centers and industry offers us the unique capability to develop and implement the next generation of innovative cancer immunotherapies for our patients.

Learn more

Contact us

Cheryl Krieger
Program Administrator
Phone: 716-845-4106
Email: Cheryl.Krieger@RoswellPark.org