Immune cells undergo spontaneous changes on a daily basis, creating errant cells that could lead to cancers if not for the diligent surveillance of the immune system, according to a recent study Medical News Today reported.

Researchers from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Australia found that the immune system is responsible for producing errant B cells and then eliminating the potentially cancerous cells before they develop into Non-Hodgkin's lymphomas, according to a press release.

About 356,000 cases of Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma are reported worldwide each year, including 70,000 in the United States, Forbes reported. That incidence is lower than researchers expected.

"Each and every one of us has spontaneous mutations in our immune B cells that occur as a result of their normal function," Dr. Axel Kallies, who made the discovery with colleagues while investigating the development of B-Cell lymphomas, said in a statement. "It is then somewhat of a paradox that B cell lymphoma is not more common in the population."

Kallies added that the immune surveillance by T cells enable early detection and elimination of the cancerous and pre-cancerous cells, and "proves that immune surveillance is essential to preventing the development of this blood cancer."

Researchers made the discovery while investigating how B cells change when Lymphoma develops.

"As part of the research, we disabled the T cells to suppress the immune system and, to our surprise, found that lymphoma developed in a matter of weeks, where it would normally take years," Kallies said. "It seems that our immune system is better equipped than we imagined to identify and eliminate cancerous B cells, a process that is driven by the immune T cells in our body."

In a statement, David Tarlinton, associate professor at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, said the research would enable scientists to identify pre-cancerous cells in the initial stages of their development and lead to early intervention for patients at risk of developing B-cell lymphoma.

"In the majority of patients, the first sign that something is wrong is finding an established tumor, which in many cases is difficult to treat," Tarlinton said. "Now that we know B-cell lymphoma is suppressed by the immune system, we could use this information to develop a diagnostic test that identifies people in early stages of this disease, before tumors develop and they progress to cancer.

There are already therapies that could remove these "aberrant" B cells in at-risk patients, so once a test is developed it can be rapidly moved towards clinical use.