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Unraveling the role of CCR1 in tumor myeloid cells

Pancreatic cancer (PDA) is a highly resistant and difficult-to-treat tumor type, often marked by extensive fibroinflammatory stroma and infiltration of immunosuppressive myeloid cells. These myeloid cells, including macrophages and granulocytes, have...

FAP-CD40 and PD1-IL2v combination therapy reprograms immunologically cold tumors through de novo intratumoral T cell-dendritic cell clusters

In a KPC tumor model, Nguyen et al. combined a FAP-targeted CD40 agonist (FAP-CD40; localizes CD40 stimulation to the TME) and PD1–IL-2v (targets a mutated IL-2 to PD-1+ T cells and not Tregs). FAP-C...

Explainable machine learning-guided integrated multiomics analysis reveals macrophage-driven immune suppression in breast cancer

Azimazade et al. developed an explainable machine learning (XML) pipeline to study associations between clinical outcomes and in silico estimated cell types within the TIME of over 5,000 METABRIC and ...

Pembrolizumab plus high-dose IL-2 in advanced clear cell renal cell carcinoma: six-year survival outcomes and molecular signatures from a phase 2 trial

In a phase 2 clinical trial of a short-course regimen (median 7 months) of pembrolizumab (anti-PD-1) plus high-dose IL-2 in patients with advanced ccRCC, Johnson et al. reported that at a median follo...

Targeting tumor-intrinsic STK40 induces immune vulnerability and drives T cell reinvigoration

Using in vivo CRISPR screens, Zhu et al. identified serine/threonine kinase 40 (STK40) as a novel regulator of immune evasion in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Stk40 loss disrupted COP1-mediated IFNG...

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Previous Digests

AI reads between the sequences to decode TCR specificity

June 3, 2026

Predicting TCR recognition from sequence alone is challenging because TCRs with low sequence similarity may bind the same peptide–MHC (pMHC), whereas nearly identical TCR sequences may bind different pMHCs. Wang, Yeh, et al. developed a new approach to map...

Yin and Yang of tumoral NK cells: cytotoxic and suppressive phenotypes uncovered

May 19, 2026

NK cells are promising targets for cancer immunotherapy, but clinical results have so far been limited. Therefore, there is a need to better understand NK cell subphenotypes and their function in tumors. Two recent papers characterized tumoral NK cells...

Intratumoral anti-CTLA-4 could reduce severe AEs: Results from a phase 1b clinical trial

May 13, 2026

The combination of nivolumab (anti-PD-1) and ipilimumab (anti-CTLA-4), both administered intravenously, has been approved for the treatment of cancer in a variety of settings since 2015, but its use is frequently hindered by severe adverse events, more often associated...

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