Lausanne, May 20 -- People's immune systems deteriorate as they age, making cancer therapies that rely on immune cells difficult to implement.

In a new study, researchers from the University of Lausanne (UNIL), the Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), the Geneva University Hospitals (HUG), and the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL) show that age-related immune decline has a measurable impact on CAR-T cell therapy, one of the most advanced forms of cancer immunotherapy.

CAR-T therapy works by engineering a patient's T-cells to recognize and destroy cancer cells. But the study found that CAR-T cells from aged mice had poor mitochondrial function, lower "stemness", and reduced antitumor activity. The culprit: a drop in levels ...