Kolkata: A team from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Kolkata has developed a “friendly bacteria” that can safely and effectively fight cancer from within the patient’s body, the premier institute announced in a statement.

Alongside this breakthrough, the team is also developing a detection system capable of monitoring the progress of the therapy. Together, these innovations mark a new frontier in the combined therapeutic and diagnostic approach to cancer treatment, IISER Kolkata said.

Their project, titled ReSET (Reprogramming the Suppressive Environment of Tumour Microenvironment), addresses one of the biggest barriers in cancer therapy. According to the statement, “Cancer often hides behind special immune cells called T regulatory cells (Tregs), which suppress the body’s natural defence system. This makes standard therapies like immunotherapy or chemotherapy less effective.”

Taking a bold and innovative approach, the IISER Kolkata team is engineering probiotics that can detect tumors and disrupt Tregs activity, reactivating the immune system against cancer. In simple terms, they are converting friendly microbes into living, targeted medicines that could one day work from inside the patient’s body to make cancer treatment safer and more effective.

Moving beyond the lab, the students have integrated human practices into their design by engaging with oncologists, surgeons, cancer survivors, and NGOs. They have also organized outreach programs in schools, cancer awareness campaigns, and collaborated with hair donors and patient support groups. These dialogues helped shape the therapy to be scientifically sound, ethically responsible, and socially relevant.

The team emphasizes that their work is not only a scientific prototype but also a proof of concept demonstrating that India’s youth can drive world-class research. “By targeting the Tregs pathway with engineered bacteria, we hope to bring forward a completely new class of cancer therapeutics, one that will revolutionize the way we treat cancer,” the team noted.

The group of 11 undergraduate students from IISER Kolkata will represent their institute and India at the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) Grand Jamboree 2025, the world’s largest synthetic biology competition, to be held in Paris in October this year.

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