«Our findings point to two potential impacts from additional research — analyzing the diversity and
composition of the
microbiome to
predict response to immunotherapy and modulating the gut
microbiome to enhance treatment,» said Wargo, senior researcher on the project and co-leader of the Melanoma Moon Shot ™, part of MD Anderson's Moon Shots Program ™ to reduce cancer deaths by accelerating development of therapies from scientific discoveries.
They also plan to evaluate whether colorectal tumor
microbiome composition can be assayed from stool samples, and if this data can also be used to
predict the type of mutations present in the tumor cells.