2023
August
IL-2 therapy requires IL-Rα binding to stimulate tumor-specific immune responses
August 30, 2023
Recent advances in IL-2 treatment strategies have led to the development of IL-2Rβγ-biased approaches in which toxicity is expected to be lower. However, recent clinical research has shown disappointing results. Wu, Chia, et al. assessed the mode of action of various IL-2 constructs to help the future design of IL-2 treatments. Their results...
Failing fast: CD8+ T cell dysfunction programming is induced early in tumors
August 16, 2023
Tumor-specific CD8+ T cells can be strong effectors in the immune battle against cancer, but they are often limited by dysfunction/exhaustion induced by the tumor microenvironment. Rudloff et al. investigated this dysfunction by comparing differentiation, cell division, and chromatin accessibility in antigen-specific CD8+ T cells in tumor versus acute infection models. This revealed...
New insights on the mechanism of action of anti-CTLA-4 immune checkpoint blockade
August 9, 2023
The mechanism of action of anti-CTLA-4 therapy remains incompletely understood. Hypotheses suggest that either antagonism of CTLA-4:B7 binding or Fc effector-mediated regulatory T cell (Treg) depletion might be responsible for the efficacy of the therapy. Lax et al. researched both these mechanisms with engineered antibodies, allowing testing of separate and combined antagonism and...
IL-7R(hi) CD8+ T cells keep cancer from making a comeback
August 2, 2023
Melanomas are often immunogenic and responsive to surgical resection and checkpoint blockade therapies; however, tumor recurrence is still a common problem. To better understand and ultimately prevent tumor recurrence, Micevic and Daniels et al. recently identified a population of L-7Rhi CD8+ T cells that is mostly tumor-specific, is maintained in lymph nodes long-term...
