Is it possible to use the body's own immune system to fight cancer?

A universal cancer cure is one of the most desired and elusive treatments in medicine. Doctors who use immunotherapy and patients own immune cells to fight cancer think they might be on the right track to finding that catch-all fix, according to the New York Times.

The treatment, called CAR, works by engineering patients’ T-cells outside the body to recognize proteins in the cancer cells as enemies. The cells are then reintroduced to the patients’ bodies, where they will aggressively attack cancer cells (if all goes according to plan). With their immune system sent into overdrive, many patients end up violently ill before they get better, but still some have fully recovered with no trace of cancer.

So far, the treatment works best on certain kinds of blood cancers. But researchers say promising developments lie ahead—that they’re now in the Model T era of CAR treatment and the Tesla CAR treatment era is coming.

Check out the New York Times to see the journeys of the researchers who are leading these studies and cases of specific patients on whom the CAR treatment succeeded and failed.