The search for a suitable biomarker which indicates immune system responses in cancer patients has been long and arduous, but a widely known biomarker has emerged as a potential candidate for this purpose. C-Reactive Protein (CRP) is an acute-phase plasma protein that can be used as a marker for activation of the immune system. The short plasma half-life and relatively robust and reliable response to inflammation, make CRP an ideal candidate marker for inflammation. The high- sensitivity test for CRP, termed Low-Reactive Protein (LRP, L-CRP or hs-CRP), measures very low levels of CRP more accurately, and is even more reliable than standard CRP for this purpose. Usually, static sampling of CRP has been used for clinical studies and these can predict disease presence or recurrence, notably for a number of cancers. We have used frequent serial L-CRP measurements across three clinical laboratories in two countries and for different advanced cancers, and have demonstrated similar, repeatable observations of a cyclical variation in CRP levels in these patients. We hypothesise that these L-CRP oscillations are part of a homeostatic immune response to advanced malignancy and have some preliminary data linking the timing of therapy to treatment success. This article reviews CRP, shows some of our data and advances the reasoning for the hypothesis that explains the CRP cycles in terms of homeostatic immune regulatory cycles. This knowledge might also open the way for improved timing of treatment(s) for improved clinical efficacy.

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We describe successful immunotherapy of murine AIDS (MAIDS) in C57BL/6J mice based on the elimination of replicating CD4+ regulator T cells. We demonstrate that a single injection of the antimitotic drug vinblastine (Vb) given 14 days postinfection (p.i.) with LP-BM5 can prevent MAIDS progression. Treatment with anti-CD4 mAb at 14 days p.i. is similarly able to prevent MAIDS. Treatment at other time points with Vb or anti-CD4 mAb is ineffective. The effect is based on ablation of a replicating dominantly suppressive CD4+ T cell population, as indicated by adoptive transfer and in vivo depletion experiments using mAbs against CD4 as well as combinations of mAbs against the known regulatory cell surface markers CD25, GITR, and CTLA-4. Cell surface marker analysis shows a population of CD4+CD25+ cells arising shortly before day 14 p.i. Cytokine analyses show a peak in IL-10 production from day 12 to day 16 p.i. MAIDS-infected mice also have CD4+ T cells with significantly higher expression levels of CD38 and particularly CD69, which have been demonstrated to be regulator T cell markers in the Friend retroviral model. The immunotherapy appears to prevent disease progression, although no protection against reinfection with LP-BM5 is generated. These data define a new therapy for murine retroviral infection, which has potential for use in other diseases where T regulator cell-mediated immunosuppression plays a role in the disease process.

Over 50 years of cancer therapy history reveals complete clinical responses (CRs) from remarkably divergent forms of therapies (eg, chemotherapy, radiotherapy, surgery, vaccines, autologous cell transfers, cytokines, monoclonal antibodies) for advanced solid malignancies occur with an approximately similar frequency of 5%–10%. This has remained frustratingly almost static. However, CRs usually underpin strong durable 5-year patient survival. How can this apparent paradox be explained? Over some 20 years, realization that (1) chronic inflammation is intricately associated with cancer, and (2) the immune system is delicately balanced between responsiveness and tolerance of cancer, provides a greatly significant insight into ways cancer might be more effectively treated. In this review, divergent aspects from the largely segmented literature and recent conferences are drawn together to provide observations revealing some emerging reasoning, in terms of “final common pathways” of cancer cell damage, immune stimulation, and auto-vaccination events, ultimately leading to cancer cell destruction. Created from this is a unifying overarching concept to explain why multiple approaches to cancer therapy can provide complete responses at almost equivalent rates. This “missing” aspect provides a reasoned explanation for what has, and is being, increasingly reported in the mainstream literature – that inflammatory and immune responses appear intricately associated with, if not causative of, complete responses induced by divergent forms of cancer therapy. Curiously, whether by chemotherapy, radiation, surgery, or other means, therapy-induced cell injury results, leaving inflammation and immune system stimulation as a final common denominator across all of these mechanisms of cancer therapy. This aspect has been somewhat obscured and has been “lost in translation” to date.

BackgroundThis year marks the twentieth anniversary of the approval by the US Food and Drug Administration of interleukin-2 (IL2) for use in cancer therapy, initially for renal cell carcinoma and later for melanoma. IL2 therapy for cancer has stood the test of time, with continued widespread use in Europe, parts of Asia, and the US. Clinical complete responses are variably reported at 5%–20% for advanced malignant melanoma and renal cell carcinoma, with strong durable responses and sustained long-term 5–10-year survival being typical if complete responses are generated.MethodsThe literature was reviewed for the actions and clinical effects of IL2 on subsets of T cells. The influence of IL2 on clinical efficacy was also sought.ResultsThe review revealed that IL2 is capable of stimulating different populations of T cells in humans to induce either T effector or T regulatory responses. This apparent “functional paradox” has confounded a clear understanding of the mechanisms behind the clinical effects that are observed during and following administration of IL2 therapy. An average complete response rate of around 7% in small and large clinical trials using IL2 for advanced renal cell carcinoma and malignant melanoma has been shown from a recent review of the literature.ConclusionThis review considers the published literature concerning the actions and emerging clinical effects of IL2 therapy, spanning its 20-year period in clinical use. It further details some of the recently described “bimodal” effects of IL2 to explain the apparent functional paradox, and how IL2 might be harnessed to emerge rapidly as a much more effective and predictable clinical agent in the near future.

Complete response (CR) rates reported for cytotoxic chemotherapy for late-stage cancer patients are generally low, with few exceptions, regardless of the solid cancer type or drug regimen. We investigated CR rates reported in the literature for clinical trials using chemotherapy alone, across a wide range of tumour types and chemotherapeutic regimens, to determine an overall CR rate for late-stage cancers. A total of 141 reports were located using the PubMed database. A meta-analysis was performed of reported CR from 68 chemotherapy trials (total 2732 patients) using standard agents across late-stage solid cancers—a binomial model with random effects was adopted. Mean CR rates were compared for different cancer types, and for chemotherapeutic agents with different mechanisms of action, using a logistic regression. Our results showed that the CR rates for chemotherapy treatment of late-stage cancer were generally low at 7.4%, regardless of the cancer type or drug regimen used. We found no evidence that CR rates differed between different chemotherapy drug types, but amongst different cancer types small CR differences were evident, although none exceeded a mean CR rate of 11%. This remarkable concordance of CR rates regardless of cancer or therapy type remains currently unexplained, and motivates further investigation.

Radiation-induced immune-mediated abscopal effects (AE) of conventional radiotherapy are very rare. Whole-tumor irradiation leads to lymphopenia due to killing of immune cells in the tumor microenvironment, resulting in immunosuppression and weak abscopal potential. This limitation may be overcome by partial tumor irradiation sparing the peritumoral immune-environment, and consequent shifting of immune-suppressive to immune-stimulatory effect. This would improve the radiation-directed tumor cell killing, adding to it a component of immune-mediated killing. Our preclinical findings showed that the high-single-dose irradiation of hypoxic tumor cells generates a stronger bystander effect (BE) and AE than the normoxic cells, suggesting their higher “immunogenic potential”. This led to the development of a novel Stereotactic Body RadioTherapy (SBRT)-based PArtial Tumor irradiation targeting HYpoxic segment (SBRT-PATHY) for induction of the immune-mediated BE and AE. Encouraging SBRT-PATHY-clinical outcomes, together with immunohistochemical and gene-expression analyses of surgically removed abscopal-tumor sites, suggested that delivery of the high-dose radiation to the partial (hypoxic) tumor volume, with optimal timing based on the homeostatic fluctuation of the immune response and sparing the peritumoral immune-environment, would significantly enhance the immune-mediated anti-tumor effects. This review discusses the current evidence on the safety and efficacy of SBRT-PATHY in the treatment of unresectable hypoxic bulky tumors and its bystander and abscopal immunomodulatory potential.