“…HLA class I expression appears to be lost or downregulated on the tumor cell surface, which could represent a mechanism by which neoplastic cells escape killing by CTLs, allowing tumor dissemination and metastasis (Pistillo et al, 2000). HLA class I antigen downregulation has been used as a prognostic biomarker in esophageal cancer (Hosch et al, 1997), melanoma (Kageshita et al, 1999), lung cancer (Kikuchi et al, 2007), ovarian cancer (Vitale et al, 2005), renal cell carcinoma (Kitamura et al, 2007), bladder cancer (Homma et al, 2009), and oral squamous cell carcinoma (Koike et al, 2020) and has improved the survival of patients. In our study, the expression levels of class I HLA molecules, which are responsible for antigen presentation to tumor-killing T-cells, and the expression levels of class II HLA molecules, which are responsible for antigen presentation to helper T-cells, were decreased in some patients.…”