Cancers, Vol. 11, Pages 624: Immune Checkpoint Ligand Reverse Signaling: Looking Back to Go Forward in Cancer Therapy

Cancers, Vol. 11, Pages 624: Immune Checkpoint Ligand Reverse Signaling: Looking Back to Go Forward in Cancer Therapy Cancers doi: 10.3390/cancers11050624 Authors: Daniele Lecis Sabina Sangaletti Mario P. Colombo Claudia Chiodoni The so-called immune checkpoints are pathways that regulate the timing and intensity of the immune response to avoid an excessive reaction and to protect the host from autoimmunity. Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) are designed to target the negative regulatory pathways of T cells, and they have been shown to restore anti-tumor immune functions and achieve considerable clinical results. Indeed, several clinical trials have reported durable clinical response in different tumor types, such as melanoma, renal cell carcinoma (RCC) and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Nonetheless, after the initial enthusiasm, it is now evident that the majority of patients do not benefit from ICIs, due to innate or acquired tumor resistance. It is therefore mandatory to find ways to identify those patients who will respond and to find ways to induce response in those who at present do not benefit from ICIs. In this regard, the expression of programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) on neoplastic cells was the first, and most obvious, biomarker exploited to predict the activity of anti-programmed death 1 (PD-1) and/or anti-PD-L1 antibodies. As expected, a correlation was confirmed between the levels of PD-L1 and the efficacy of anti-PD-1 therapy in melanoma, N...
Source: Cancers - Category: Cancer & Oncology Authors: Tags: Review Source Type: research