Previous studies revealed that cancer-restraining cancer-associated fibroblasts express Meflin as a marker in pancreatic cancer, and further research has shown that Meflin can also be a good predictive marker for immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) response in non-small-cell lung cancer.
Cells that break away from a tumor and colonize other regions of the body express genes that are different from those of the cancer from which they originate. Now, a Baylor College of Medicine study has found that metastases can be classified into four cancer subtypes regardless of the primary cancer. This finding describes which genes are active in each one, making it possible to establish the most appropriate treatments for each patient according to the subtype of metastasis they have developed.
While immune checkpoint inhibitors have revolutionized oncology, still only 20-30% of patients respond to PD-1/PD-L1 antibody monotherapy. This can be due to a failure of T cells to recognize “cold” tumors (low T-cell infiltrates).
Nextpoint Therapeutics Inc. closed an $80 million series B round to move two novel immune checkpoint inhibitor programs into clinical development in the coming year. The Cambridge, Mass.-based firm is planting a flag in an area of immune signaling that has been largely overlooked by drug developers until now.
Severe toxicities associated with immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) therapy are a major challenge of this anticancer therapy approach. While myocarditis is a rare immune-related adverse event in patients receiving ICIs, it has a nearly 50% mortality rate and its pathogenesis is poorly understood. In the current study, researchers from Vanderbilt University and affiliated organizations published data from a study that evaluated a novel mouse model recapitulating clinical and pathological features of ICI-associated myocarditis (ICI-MC).
Tumor mutational burden (TMB), a biomarker used to assess whether a patient will respond to immunotherapy, needs to be recalculated in order to be useful for patients of Asian or African descent. Scientists at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute found a significant bias in the estimated TMB values affecting these populations and adjusted them for those patients.
While simultaneous targeting of PD-1 and TGF-β has been previously suggested to be a favorable strategy to reverse immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) resistance of tumors, the hydrophobicity of TGF-β inhibitors and latent drug-related adverse events of this treatment hindered its utility.
Akeso Inc. has been given the green light by China’s NMPA for its PD-1/CTLA-4 antibody Kaitanni (cadonilimab), which was approved for the treatment of patients with relapsed or metastatic cervical cancer whose disease has progressed on or after platinum-based chemotherapy.
