But something about cancer cells makes them invisible to the immune system.
Prostate cancer is the second leading cause of death among men.
That makes prostate cancer a priority for Christopher S. Henney, PhD, CEO of Dendreon Corporation in Seattle. His company has been working for 8 years on ways to trigger immune cells, T cells, to fight prostate cancer. Dendrites recognize chemical structures called antigens on the surface of disease-causing cells and break them up into fragments. This eliminates the infected cell. In the case of a cancer cell, it destroys the cancer.