"Sharon Belvins nightmare with cancer began in  when she was just . Belvin was an avid runner but said she suddenly found she couldnt climb the stairs without a lot of difficulty breathing. Eventually after months of fruitless treatments for lung ailments like bronchitis she was diagnosed with melanoma  a very serious skin cancer. It had already spread to her lungs and the prognosis was grim. She had about a  chance of surviving the next six months. Yeah that was the turning point of life right there she says. What Belvin didnt know at the time was that a revolutionary treatment for melanoma had begun testing in clinical trials. An immunologist named Jim Allison httpfaculty.mdanderson.orgJames_AllisonDefault.aspSNID now at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center had figured out that if the immune system was tweaked just right it could do a better job of killing the cancer than the usual treatments. Joe Palca worked for Allison http early in both mens careers. Allisons treatment was still experimental but if it worked it had the potential to save Belvins life. Its a new modality for treating cancer Dr. Samuel Broder https a former director of the National Cancer Institute says now of Allisons pioneering research. It used to be there were three basic treatment options for cancer  surgery radiation and chemotherapy  or some combination of those three. Its fair to say theres now a fourth option. Allisons long search for this new kind of treatment  one that has since become a lifesaver for some cancer patients  began around a decade before Belvin got sick when Allison was running a lab at the University of California Berkeley. At the time he was what you could call a research scientists research scientist. He was fascinated by certain powerful cells of the immune system  T cells. A subset of white blood cells T cells travel around the body and can protect us against just about anything Allison says. T cells do recognize cancer cells but not in a way that can eliminate the disease. Allison had been studying T cells for years and thought that by tinkering with one key molecule on the outside of these cells he could enhance their response to cancer enough to eradicate the illness. He and one of his grad students ran an experiment to test the tweaked T cells on cancerous tumors in mice and the initial results astounded them. The T cells seemed to be doing just what Allison had hoped they would do  shrink the tumors and kill the cancer. Allison repeated the experiment with more mice over his winter break. After a few tense days the tumors again disappeared. These mice were cured Allison says. Cancer cured Ive been doing this sort of stuff for years and Id never seen anything like that Allison says. And I thought If we could do that in people this is going to be amazing.  Allison tried to persuade drugmakers to create a human version of the treatment that had worked in mice. He thought they would jump at the chance to try a new approach. But the biotech companies he met with didnt bite. In those days most firms were focused on drugs that would target tumors directly and Allison was asking them to try something very different. This was targeting the immune system not the cancer he says. We werent trying to kill the cancer cells. We were letting the T cells kill the cancer cells. Thanks but no thanks the companies told him. I got very depressed Allison says. He was sure this was the most important work of his career but he had to get others on board. Eventually a scientist attending one of Allisons research talks was intrigued enough to contact a pal at the biotech firm Medarex. The company had recently developed technology that could make a human version of Allisons therapy and was willing to give it a try. It took a decade but eventually Allisons big idea was ready for testing in people. A clinical trial to study the drug  now called ipilimumab http or Ippy for short  was set up at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City. Allison decided he wanted to be part of this next chapter in the testing of immunotherapy so he packed up his California lab and moved it to Sloan Kettering. As it happens Belvin was also in New York  a patient of Dr. Jedd Wolchok https at Sloan Kettering. By the fall of  Belvin had run through all the treatment options available to her. Nothing had worked to control the melanoma it continued to spread dangerously throughout her body. Belvin remembers feeling sick and depressed and says she wasnt even paying much attention when Wolchok walked into the exam room and suggested one last treatment. Sharon we have an opportunity to participate in a clinical trial here. Its something you should consider Wolchok told her. Belvin says she signed up without hesitation. After just four injections of Ippy across three months her cancer was nearly gone. And at Belvins followup appointment a year later Wolchok delivered news that was hard for her to take in Sharon you no longer have cancer. And in the next breath Belvin recalls he goes Oh the guy who invented this is upstairs. Do you want to meet him  Yes of course I want to meet him she told her doctor. Wolchok called Allison who was working nearby and told him to drop everything and come to the clinic  a part of the hospital Allison had rarely seen. Though the research scientist couldnt imagine why Wolchok was in such a rush he quickly figured it out as he opened the door and was greeted by Belvin with a huge hug. Belvin says she tried not to tackle him. It was hard to control myself she says. I owe this man my life. Belvin was the first recipient of the immunotherapy that Allison had ever met. It really meant a lot he says. It reminded me what its all about at the end of the day. That was in  today Sharon Belvin is still cancerfree. Ippy is now sold under the brand name Yervoy by BristolMyers Squibb which bought Medarex in . Meanwhile Jim Allison has become a bit of a celebrity in the cancer research world. Among other honors he was a  recipient of the prestigious Lasker Award http for his achievements in medical science. Hes become wellknown among patients too. Now and again Allison fields calls from patients yearning to learn from the master himself what it will take to cure their disease. Allison cant really answer them. Each case is different and using a patients own cells to destroy tumors wont work in every patient or in every type of cancer. Still the approach offers promise to some people that other therapies cant and has transformed the way doctors think about cancer treatment. It might be too early to say were going to cure cancer Allison says but were going to cure certain types of cancers. Weve got a shot at it now."