Investigating the role of NK-Innate Immune Cell interactions in Oesophageal Cancer

Natural killer cells are a type of immune cell able to initiate an immune response without prior activation. Like many other types of immune cell these are often dysregulated in cancer preventing the effective clearance of tumour cells. Due to this natural killer cells have been of recent interest to cancer therapy as they are able to elicit potent anti-tumour responses. Oesophageal adenocarcinoma is an aggressive type of cancer with limited responses to available treatments, due to which has a 5-year survival rate of only 20% and its incidence is increasing. Eosinophils are another important immune cell in cancer regulation as they also play a role in the activation and recruitment of other immune cells. Although eosinophils have differing effects based on the tumour type, they have recently been suggested to have a protective effect in oesophageal cancer, despite this they are frequently overlooked in cancer research. This project aims to better understand the interactions between NK cells and eosinophils to enable the development of more effective treatments for oesophageal cancers. Here, cellular and molecular biology techniques will be used to study the interactions between eosinophils and natural killer cells in oesophageal cancer compared to healthy tissue to understand how these pathways can be manipulated and in future possibly inform better treatment combinations against this difficult to treat cancer.