Somatic Mutations and Neoepitope Homology in Melanomas Treated with CTLA-4 Blockade.

ABSTRACT: Immune checkpoint inhibitors are promising treatments for patients with a variety of malignancies. Toward understanding the determinants of response to immune checkpoint inhibitors, it was previously demonstrated that the presence of somatic mutations is associated with benefit from checkpoint inhibition. A hypothesis was posited that neoantigen homology to pathogens may in part explain the link between somatic mutations and response. To further examine this hypothesis, we reanalyzed cancer exome data obtained from our previously published study of 64 melanoma patients treated with CTLA-4 blockade and a new dataset of RNA-Seq data from 24 of these patients. We found that the ability to accurately predict patient benefit did not increase as the analysis narrowed from somatic mutation burden

SUBMITTER: Nathanson T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5253347 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature