University of Queensland scientist Associate Professor Arutha Kulasinghe, a researcher of Sri Lankan origin, has led a global study that could transform how lung cancer patients are treated.
The research, published in Nature Genetics, has uncovered a way to predict whether patients with non-small cell lung cancer will respond to costly immunotherapy drugs such as Keytruda, which work for only about 20 to 30 per cent of patients.
Kulasinghe and his team analysed lung tumour biopsies from nearly 250 patients across Australia, the United States, and Europe, using advanced microscopes and artificial intelligence to map millions of cells in each sample.