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Jani S, Church CD, Nghiem P. Insights into anti-tumor immunity via the polyomavirus shared across human Merkel cell carcinomas. Front Immunol 2023; 14:1172913. [PMID: 37287968 PMCID: PMC10242112 DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2023.1172913] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/24/2023] [Accepted: 04/27/2023] [Indexed: 06/09/2023] Open
Abstract
Understanding and augmenting cancer-specific immunity is impeded by the fact that most tumors are driven by patient-specific mutations that encode unique antigenic epitopes. The shared antigens in virus-driven tumors can help overcome this limitation. Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is a particularly interesting tumor immunity model because (1) 80% of cases are driven by Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCPyV) oncoproteins that must be continually expressed for tumor survival; (2) MCPyV oncoproteins are only ~400 amino acids in length and are essentially invariant between tumors; (3) MCPyV-specific T cell responses are robust and strongly linked to patient outcomes; (4) anti-MCPyV antibodies reliably increase with MCC recurrence, forming the basis of a standard clinical surveillance test; and (5) MCC has one of the highest response rates to PD-1 pathway blockade among all solid cancers. Leveraging these well-defined viral oncoproteins, a set of tools that includes over 20 peptide-MHC class I tetramers has been developed to facilitate the study of anti-tumor immunity across MCC patients. Additionally, the highly immunogenic nature of MCPyV oncoproteins forces MCC tumors to develop robust immune evasion mechanisms to survive. Indeed, several immune evasion mechanisms are active in MCC, including transcriptional downregulation of MHC expression by tumor cells and upregulation of inhibitory molecules including PD-L1 and immunosuppressive cytokines. About half of patients with advanced MCC do not persistently benefit from PD-1 pathway blockade. Herein, we (1) summarize the lessons learned from studying the anti-tumor T cell response to virus-positive MCC; (2) review immune evasion mechanisms in MCC; (3) review mechanisms of resistance to immune-based therapies in MCC and other cancers; and (4) discuss how recently developed tools can be used to address open questions in cancer immunotherapy. We believe detailed investigation of this model cancer will provide insight into tumor immunity that will likely also be applicable to more common cancers without shared tumor antigens.
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Affiliation(s)
- Saumya Jani
- Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - Candice D. Church
- Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - Paul Nghiem
- Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
- Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, Seattle, WA, United States
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Martikainen M, Ramachandran M, Lugano R, Ma J, Martikainen MM, Dimberg A, Yu D, Merits A, Essand M. IFN-I-tolerant oncolytic Semliki Forest virus in combination with anti-PD1 enhances T cell response against mouse glioma. Mol Ther Oncolytics 2021; 21:37-46. [PMID: 33869741 PMCID: PMC8042242 DOI: 10.1016/j.omto.2021.03.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/07/2020] [Accepted: 03/14/2021] [Indexed: 12/25/2022]
Abstract
Oncolytic virotherapy holds promise of effective immunotherapy against otherwise nonresponsive cancers such as glioblastoma. Our previous findings have shown that although oncolytic Semliki Forest virus (SFV) is effective against various mouse glioblastoma models, its therapeutic potency is hampered by type I interferon (IFN-I)-mediated antiviral signaling. In this study, we constructed a novel IFN-I-resistant SFV construct, SFV-AM6, and evaluated its therapeutic potency in vitro, ex vivo, and in vivo in the IFN-I competent mouse GL261 glioma model. In vitro analysis shows that SFV-AM6 causes immunogenic apoptosis in GL261 cells despite high IFN-I signaling. MicroRNA-124 de-targeted SFV-AM6-124T selectively replicates in glioma cells, and it can infect orthotopic GL261 gliomas when administered intraperitoneally. The combination of SFV-AM6-124T and anti-programmed death 1 (PD1) immunotherapy resulted in increased immune cell infiltration in GL261 gliomas, including an increased tumor-reactive CD8+ fraction. Our results show that SFV-AM6-124T can overcome hurdles of innate anti-viral signaling. Combination therapy with SFV-AM6-124T and anti-PD1 promotes the inflammatory response and improves the immune microenvironment in the GL261 glioma model.
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Affiliation(s)
- Miika Martikainen
- Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
- Corresponding author: Miika Martikainen, Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, 75185 Uppsala, Sweden.
| | - Mohanraj Ramachandran
- Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Roberta Lugano
- Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Jing Ma
- Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | | | - Anna Dimberg
- Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Di Yu
- Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
| | - Andres Merits
- Institute of Technology, University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia
| | - Magnus Essand
- Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
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Krause AL, Schuetz F, Boudewijns M, Pritsch M, Wallwiener M, Golatta M, Rom J, Heil J, Sohn C, Schneeweiss A, Beckhove P, Domschke C. Parity improves anti-tumor immunity in breast cancer patients. Oncotarget 2017; 8:104981-104991. [PMID: 29285226 PMCID: PMC5739613 DOI: 10.18632/oncotarget.20756] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/08/2017] [Accepted: 08/04/2017] [Indexed: 12/27/2022] Open
Abstract
Compared to nulliparous women, parous women have an up to 50% lower lifetime risk of developing breast cancer. An endogenous mechanism to prevent the development of cancer is the destruction of tumor cells by T cells that recognize tumor-associated antigens (TAA). Since a number of TAA are also highly present in the breast and placenta of pregnant women, we investigated the induction and characteristics of spontaneous T cell responses against TAA during pregnancy. To this end, we collected peripheral blood from healthy nulliparous, primigravid and parous women, as well as from breast cancer patients. IFN-γ ELISpot assays were performed to measure the intensity and specificity of T cell responses against 11 different TAA. The impact of TAA-specific Treg cells on anti-TAA responses was assessed by performing the assay before and after depletion of CD4+CD25+ T cells. The antigenic specificities of these Treg cells were analyzed by the Treg specificity assay. Furthermore, we conducted flow cytometric analyses to determine the memory phenotype and cytokine secretion profile of TAA-specific T cells. Our results demonstrate that pregnancy induces functional and long-lived memory and effector T cells that react against multiple TAA. These persist for many decades in parous females, but are not found in age-matched females without children. We also detected TAA-specific Treg cells, which suppressed strong effector T cell responses after delivery. Nulliparous breast cancer patients displayed median TAA-specific effector T cell responses to be decreased threefold compared to parous patients, which could be restored in vitro after depletion of Treg cells.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anna-Lena Krause
- Translational Immunology Division, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Florian Schuetz
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Marc Boudewijns
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Maria Pritsch
- Translational Immunology Division, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Markus Wallwiener
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Michael Golatta
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Joachim Rom
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Joerg Heil
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Christof Sohn
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Andreas Schneeweiss
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Philipp Beckhove
- Translational Immunology Division, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg, Germany.,Regensburg Center for Interventional Immunology (RCI) and University Medical Center of Regensburg, Regensburg, Germany
| | - Christoph Domschke
- Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Heidelberg University Hospital, National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT), Heidelberg, Germany
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