Cutting Edge Lectures in Science: Inflammation, the fuel of cancer: extinguishing the fire to stop the disease
A presentation by Dr. Maya Saleh (Assistant Professor, Faculty of Medicine, McGill).
What is an inflammatory response? How is it triggered and
terminated? Is inflammation a friend or a foe? We have all
experienced the signs of inflammation in the form of redness,
swelling and heat around a blister or fever when infected with a
bacteria or a virus. Indeed, inflammation is our innate immune
response to “danger”, be it an invading pathogen, a skin cut, or
the presence of transformed or dying cells. The physiological role
of inflammation is to defend our body and restore normalcy or
homeostasis. However, when inflammation is deregulated, it is at
the basis of inflammatory diseases and is the fuel of cancer
growth.
In the last decade, the master “switches” of inflammation or the
sensors of “danger” referred to as pathogen/danger recognition
receptors have been identified. This discovery has changed
dramatically the way we perceive the role of inflammation in health
and disease, leading in many cases to direct therapeutic
applications.
In this lecture, I will discuss what we have recently learned on
the role of our innate immune response in inflammatory diseases and
cancer, with a focus on intestinal pathologies, including
inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) and colorectal cancer. I will
address the conundrum of how we co-exist with a whopping number of
bacteria in our gut without eliciting an inflammatory reaction,
whether the bacteria in our intestinal flora are “good” or “bad”,
and whether we could modify our diet to change the composition of
these bacteria for good health. I will also review the current
therapies of IBD and colitis-associated cancer and discuss the
potential need to revisit them.
Free, everyone welcome. Seating is limited. No
reservations necessary. The conference is followed by a
reception.