Immunosurveillance in clinical cancer management

Abstract

The progression of cancer involves a critical step in which malignant cells escape from control by the immune system. Antineoplastic agents are particularly efficient when they succeed in restoring such control (immunosurveillance) or at least establish an equilibrium state that slows down disease progression. This is true not only for immunotherapies, such as immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs), but also for conventional chemotherapy, targeted anticancer agents, and radiation therapy. Thus, therapeutics that stress and kill cancer cells while provoking a tumor‐targeting immune response, referred to as immunogenic cell death, are particularly useful in combination with ICIs. Modern oncology regimens are increasingly using such combinations, which are referred to as chemoimmunotherapy, as well as combinations of multiple ICIs. However, the latter are generally associated with severe side effects compared with single‐agent ICIs. Of note, the success of these combinatorial strategies against locally advanced or metastatic cancers is now spurring successful attempts to move them past the postoperative (adjuvant) setting to the preoperative (neoadjuvant) setting, even for patients with operable cancers. Here, the authors critically discuss the importance of immunosurveillance in modern clinical cancer management.

Blood–Brain Barrier Penetrating Nanovehicles for Interfering with Mitochondrial Electron Flow in Glioblastoma

“…Cancer immunotherapy, a treatment method that leverages the immune system to combat cancer, represents a potential therapeutic option. 37 However, a significant portion of GBM patients fail to respond to such treatment. 38 The diminished response observed can be ascribed to the immunosuppressive properties of GBM, which impair the ability of the innate immune system to eradicate tumors.…”

“…Cancer immunotherapy, a treatment method that leverages the immune system to combat cancer, represents a potential therapeutic option . However, a significant portion of GBM patients fail to respond to such treatment .…”

Role of Exosomes in Cancer and Aptamer-Modified Exosomes as a Promising Platform for Cancer Targeted Therapy

“…Although long-realized, tumor immunology can actually be regarded as an emerging field [ 187 ]. During the past two decades, immune system has been increasingly recognized as an important player in control or contribute to development of cancer [ 188 , 189 ]. Initially hypothesized by Schreiber et al, it has now been widely accepted that cancer immunoediting, a process consisting of three sequential phases termed elimination, equilibrium, and escape, involves in cancer evolution [ 190 ].…”

Clinical application of immunogenic cell death inducers in cancer immunotherapy: turning cold tumors hot

“… Lu et al (2021) synthesized an activator (NBS-1MT) with a small molecule inhibitor and photosensitizer and found that it can induce oxidative stress to generate considerable ICD via pyroptosis in breast cancer cells. Although preclinical studies have laid a certain theoretical foundation, the clinical transformation of the combination of targeted therapy and ICIs is still not optimistic ( Kroemer et al, 2023 ).…”