Researchers in the United Kingdom saw a protein, called DNGR-1 in the dendtritic cells, a special type of cell that specify the immune system to act on a disease by, in the case of cancer, striking at a tumor as soon as they are detected.
With the protein in the dendtritic cell showing foreign molecules, the other cells in turn destroy the cancer cells, said the research, which saw print at the Journal of Clinical Investigation
BBC News, quoting the Dr. Caetano Reise Sousa, reported the team of the Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute reported the team discovered DNGR-1 could readily bring the vaccine to the dendritic cell's door.
Sousa explained, the vaccines will deliver "sample of the offending molecule and deliver it to DNGR-1 on the dendritic cells, which in turn will present the molecule to the armies of T cells and instruct them to attack," BBC News added.
For more than three decades, scientists have been looking for proteins on the dendritic cells.
A key regulator of the immune system, Dendritic cells, which may be found in the lymph nodes and spleen, was co-discovered by Ralph Steinman in 1973, reported the website news-medical.net.
Steinman is a Kenry G. Kunkel Professor and head of the Laboratory of Cellular Physiology and Immunology at the Rockefeller University.
