The potential of cord blood to replenish young immune cells against cancer

Abstract

The immune system of elderly individuals behaves differently from young adults, leading to a general assumption that the decline of immune system function increases the susceptibility to infectious and noninfectious diseases. This agerelated internal immune function failure, termed "immune senescence," contributes to the increment of morbidity and mortality associated with diseases in elderly populations. Cord blood is considered as a source of "young" immune cells for anti-infectious immunity and adoptive cancer immunotherapy. In this review, we describe immune aging and the application of cord blood for replenishing aging immune cells against neoplastic diseases.