Blocking the PD-1/PD-L1 axis in dendritic cell-stimulated Cytokine-Induced Killer Cells with pembrolizumab enhances their therapeutic effects against hepatocellular carcinoma.

ABSTRACT: Immune checkpoint therapies for cancer, like the anti-programmed cell death 1 (PD-1) agent pembrolizumab, have gained considerable attention. However, the use of immune checkpoint inhibitors in the context of adoptive immunotherapy is poorly characterized. We investigated the therapeutic efficacy of dendritic cell-stimulated CIK (DC-CIK) cells pretreated with pembrolizumab against hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in cytotoxicity assay in vitro and in a nude mouse xenograft model. We used time-lapse imaging to investigate tumor killing. We also performed a survival analysis based on lymphocyte subpopulation-specific mRNA signatures using The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) HCC cohort (n=371 patients). The results indicated that PD-1 inhibition increased the anti-tumor effects of DC-CIK cells over

SUBMITTER: Zhang W 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6584335 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature