Editors' Picks
March 2011
in “
Journal of Investigative Dermatology
”
TLDR New findings suggest targeting IL-23 could treat psoriasis, skin cells can adapt to new roles, direct conversion of skin cells to blood cells may aid cell therapy, removing certain tumor cells could boost cancer immunotherapy, and melanoma may have many tumorigenic cells, not just cancer stem cells.
Recent studies have highlighted the role of IL-23 in psoriasis, with evidence showing its expression in psoriatic skin and immune cells, and its potential as a therapeutic target, as demonstrated by the efficacy of an IL-23-specific monoclonal antibody in a mouse model. Additionally, research on thymic epithelial cells (TECs) has shown that they can integrate into thymic networks and function as epidermal and hair follicle stem cells, suggesting skin determination is influenced by environmental cues rather than germ layer origin. In the field of reprogramming, human dermal fibroblasts have been directly converted into blood progenitors and mature cells without passing through a pluripotent state, offering a potentially safer alternative for cell replacement therapies. Moreover, the ablation of FAP+ stromal cells in tumors has been found to suppress tumor growth by interfering with immune suppression, which could improve cancer immunotherapy. Lastly, studies on melanoma have revealed a high frequency of tumorigenic cells within tumors, challenging the cancer stem cell model and suggesting that tumorigenic competence in melanoma may be a reversible state.
