Nano-radiomics unveils treatment effect on tumor microenvironment

Date:
July 13, 2020
Source:
Baylor College of Medicine
Summary:
Researchers have developed a novel noninvasive approach called
nano- radiomics that analyzes imaging data to assess changes in
the tumor microenvironment that are not detected with conventional
imaging methods.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Research has shown that the tumor microenvironment (TME) can help
cancers grow and evade the immune response. The TME has even been shown
to inhibit cellular immunotherapy, a novel form of treatment in which
the cells of a patient's immune system are re-engineered in the lab to
attack cancer cells. Therefore, scientists are now developing cellular immunotherapies that attempt not only to promote the anti-cancer activity
of the immune system, but also combat the inhibitory effect of the tumor microenvironment. While it is straightforward to assess the effect of
new therapies on the cancer cells, assessing the effectiveness on the
TME is challenging.


==========================================================================
A research team led by scientists at Baylor College of Medicine and
Texas Children's Hospital developed a new approach called nano-radiomics
that utilizes complex analyses of imaging data to assess changes in
the tumor microenvironment that cannot be detected with conventional
imaging methods.

This approach, published in the journal Science Advances, provides the
promise of a new noninvasive means to enhance current imaging methods in measuring and monitoring the effectiveness of cellular immunotherapies
designed to specifically target the TME.

"Understanding the response of the tumor microenvironment to anti-cancer therapy is becoming increasingly important," said co-corresponding
author Dr.

Robin Parihar, assistant professor of pediatric hematology-oncology
at Baylor and Texas Children's and a member of Baylor's Center for
Cell and Gene Therapy, "particularly when the tumor microenvironment is inhibiting the anti-tumor effectiveness of cellular immunotherapies that
are engineered to attack the cancer." Currently, imaging technologies
such as computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)
generate three-dimensional images that provide information about the
overall tumor response to therapy, for instance, whether it is growing
or shrinking, but provide very little, if any, information about the TME.

Parihar approached Dr. Ketan Ghaghada, assistant professor of radiology at Baylor and a member of the Translational Imaging Group (TIGr) at Texas Children's, and their laboratories began a collaboration to develop
a noninvasive method to assess the effect of a cellular immunotherapy
treatment specifically directed at the TME.

Nano-radiomics unveils treatment effect on the tumor microenvironment
Parihar, Ghaghada and their colleagues developed nano-radiomics, a novel
method that combines imaging technology using a nanoparticle contrast
agent, with radiomics for computational mining of 3-D imaging data.

"Radiomics is an emerging area in the field of radiology wherein images
are analyzed to extract information that may reveal patterns or textures
in the tumor that are not visible to the naked eye. To enhance the quality
of the images, we used a nanoparticle contrast agent developed in our
lab that has a different pattern of distribution within the tumor than traditional contrast agents, one that is indicative of changes in the
TME," said Ghaghada, co- corresponding author of this work and a member
of Baylor's Dan L Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Using mouse models of cancer, the researchers treated one group of animals
with a cellular immunotherapy that effectively eliminated the TME and
another group with a placebo. Both groups received the nanoparticle
contrast agent followed by a CT scan. Radiomics analysis of the imaging
data of both groups showed that nano-radiomics revealed texture-based
features that distinguished the two groups while traditional CT scans did
not, suggesting that this new approach has the potential to enhance the
ability of clinicians to noninvasively assess the effect of treatments
directed at the TME, ultimately enhancing the impact of cancer treatment
and management.


========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by Baylor_College_of_Medicine. Note:
Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Laxman Devkota, Zbigniew Starosolski, Charlotte H. Rivas, Igor
Stupin,
Ananth Annapragada, Ketan B. Ghaghada, Robin Parihar. Detection of
response to tumor microenvironment-targeted cellular immunotherapy
using nano-radiomics. Science Advances, 2020; 6 (28): eaba6156 DOI:
10.1126/ sciadv.aba6156 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200713154953.htm

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