2020
April
Interferon-III interferes with breast cancer
April 29, 2020
Dendritic cells play a critical role in kickstarting immune responses, and cDC1s, which cross-present antigens and activate CD8+ T cells, are of particular interest for inducing responses to immunotherapy. Previous research has shown tumor infiltration by cDC1s to be associated with favorable patient prognoses and improved clinical responses to anti-PD-1. In a paper...
Just a few neoantigens may be enough for T cells to control prostate cancer
April 22, 2020
Can checkpoint blockade benefit patients whose cancers have low tumor mutational burden? To address this question, Subudhi et al. conducted a phase II clinical trial of patients with advanced prostate cancer – a cancer known to have a relatively low mutational load – who were treated with ipilimumab, and evaluated their treatment-induced immune...
It’s best to be selective – targeting TGFβ1
April 15, 2020
TGFβ is known to play a role in immunosuppression and resistance to immune checkpoint blockade, however, efforts to block TGFβ to enhance immunotherapy have been limited by cardiotoxicity. TGFβ exists in three isoforms – TGFβ1, TGFβ2, and TGFβ3 – and while TGFβ2 and TGFβ3 have been linked to cardiac function, TGFβ1 has not...
Vaccine + chemo activate immune response against cervical cancer
April 8, 2020
While a therapeutic human papilloma virus type 16 (HPV16) vaccine can effectively promote an immune response and subsequent durable regressions of HPV16-induced premalignant lesions, it has shown no clinical benefit in patients with late-stage HPV16-induced cervical cancer. To address the immunosuppressive environment that prevents the vaccine from inducing a strong immune response in...
Release the B7.1! Anti-PD-L1 breaks PD-L1’s grip
April 1, 2020
Blocking the PD-1/PD-L1 axis using anti-PD-L1 antibodies is a commonly employed immunotherapeutic strategy to prevent PD-1-mediated inhibition of T cells by tumor cells. Suspecting that the mechanism of action of PD-L1 blockade might be more complex, however, Mayoux et al. investigated the role of PD-L1-expressing dendritic cells (DCs) in PD-L1 blockade. The results...
