A new treatment for a lethal brain cancer known as glioblastoma has shown remarkable early results, new research from the Mass General Cancer Center in Boston shows. The New England Journal of Medicine published results of a phase 1 clinical trial of a novel CAR-T used in patients with recurring glioblastoma, which showed dramatic and rapid tumor reduction.The team at the Mass General Cancer Center said the treatment's impact on glioblastoma tumors was unlike anything they'd seen with other therapies. The treatment is a new kind of what's known as CAR-T cell therapy — an approach that arms the body's own T-cells to fight the patient's cancer.The treatment is already standard care for many cancers, but this new therapy adds specially engineered T-cells — injected directly into the fluid around the brain -- which enlist other cells around them to target and kill the tumor.Dr. Marcela Maus, whose MGH lab developed the treatment, says the T-cells are a powerful weapon."Some of the things they can do is when they recognize a target, they can do that very specifically, they kill it," Maus said. "That makes it a very powerful kind of platform to build on to redirect it toward the cancer."Maus and MGH Neurosurgeon Bryan Choi say the early results from this clinical trial have been remarkable. A before and after image of one patient's brain, five days after just one injection, shows the tumor had shrunk dramatically.The study is a preliminary early trial involving just three patients to test the safety of the procedure.More research is needed, but doctors at the MGH Cancer Center say it provides a lot of hope.