Macrophages are the hungry hippos of the immune system. In this image, human macrophages (blue) have successfully engulfed tumor cells (orange) that have been flagged with a therapeutic antibody. However, even with these antibodies, cancer cells can hide from immune cells and suppress their appetite for destruction.

Researchers are working to improve treatment by stabilizing the antibodies on cancer cells, and are screening for different therapeutics that can activate macrophages to empower the body’s natural defense system against these treacherous cancer cells.

Learn more about the University of Southampton's work in cancer immunotherapy here. Work from this project was published in Cancer Immunology Research in 2019.