Cambridge researchers have discovered how T cells – an important component of our immune system – are able keep on killing as they hunt down and kill cancer cells, repeatedly reloading their ...

Mito warriors: Scientists discover how T cell assassins reload their weapons to kill and kill again New footage shows T cells hunting down and destroying cancer cells Date: October 14, 2021 Source ...

Further experiments revealed that mito + cells could easily penetrate tumors, multiply quickly and pass on their extra mitochondria to daughter cells, where they persisted for a long time.

When infused into a mouse model of melanoma, mito + cells showed significantly higher anti-tumor responses and prolonged survival rates compared to T cells without additional mitochondria.

They found that optimal mitochondrial transfer to the T cells occurred when Talin 2 – a cytoskeleton protein involved in actin filament assembly – was expressed by both the donor and recipient cell.