

Separate studies published online on February 21 in the Journal of Experimental Medicine (www.jem.org) identify a protein that drives tumour-promoting inflammation in pancreatic and breast tumours.
Inflammatory reactions come in several flavours - Th1 and Th2, for example - each classified according to the proteins, or cytokines, that predominate. Tumours are often infiltrated with cells that produce Th2 cytokines, which some studies suggest drive tumour growth. However, the signals responsible for initiating and maintaining Th2 inflammation in tumours are not fully understood.
Karolina Palucka and colleagues now find that human breast cancer cells release the cytokine thymic stromal lymphopoietin (TSLP) and that TSLP drives Th2 inflammation in human breast tumours. Maria Pia Protti and coworkers report that TSLP derived from fibroblasts - cells that provide support to tumours - fuels Th2 inflammation in human pancreatic tumours.
Although the cellular sources of TSLP differ between the two tumour types examined in these studies, the end result - Th2 inflammation - is the same. Future work is needed to determine if therapies targeting TSLP can help to block tumour growth.
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