Screening for immunogenic cell death

French researchers have used a fluorescence-based screening platform to identify small molecules that induced immunogenic cell death in mouse tumors.¹ Next, the group plans to test the best hits in a Phase I/II trial to treat locally invasive head and neck cancers in combination with chemotherapy.

In 2005, Guido Kroemer and colleagues first showed that the anthracycline chemotherapeutic doxorubicin could induce immune-mediated death of cancer cells in addition to the known process of cell death through DNA damage.² The immunogenic process was later shown to be mediated by multiple factors involved in apoptosis and autophagy.^3-6...