Immune checkpoint blockade: a common denominator approach to cancer therapy

  • Cancer Cell. 2015 Apr 13;27(4):450-61. doi: 10.1016/j.ccell.2015.03.001.
Suzanne L Topalian  1 ,  Charles G Drake  2 ,  Drew M Pardoll  3
Affiliations
  • 1. Department of Surgery, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21287, USA. Electronic address: [email protected].
  • 2. The Brady Urological Institute, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21287, USA; Department of Oncology, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21287, USA.
  • 3. Department of Oncology, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21287, USA.
PMID: 25858804 DOI: 10.1016/j.ccell.2015.03.001
Abstract

The immune system recognizes and is poised to eliminate Cancer but is held in check by inhibitory receptors and ligands. These immune checkpoint pathways, which normally maintain self-tolerance and limit collateral tissue damage during anti-microbial immune responses, can be co-opted by Cancer to evade immune destruction. Drugs interrupting immune checkpoints, such as anti-CTLA-4, anti-PD-1, anti-PD-L1, and Others in early development, can unleash anti-tumor immunity and mediate durable Cancer regressions. The complex biology of immune checkpoint pathways still contains many mysteries, and the full activity spectrum of checkpoint-blocking drugs, used alone or in combination, is currently the subject of intense study.