International Immunology

Interleukin-34 expression in ovarian cancer: a possible correlation with disease progression

Abstract Ovarian cancer is the second-most lethal gynecological malignancy and the seventh-commonest cause of cancer-related death in women around the world. Most of the ovarian cancer patients are diagnosed at advanced stages and suffer from recurrence after primary cytoreductive surgery and standard first-line chemotherapy. Thus, the successful management of ovarian cancer patients requires the identification of factors that contribute to progression and relapse. Interleukin-34 (IL-34) is a novel cytokine that acts as a tissue-specific ligand of colony-stimulating factor-1 receptor (CSF-1R). In cancer, IL-34 exerts pro-tumorigenic functions that promote tumor growth, metastasis, angiogenesis, immune suppression and therapeutic resistance. In this study, we evaluate the impact of IL-34 on progression and survival of ovarian cancer patients. First, IL-34 was found to be expressed in several human ovarian cancer cell lines and cancer tissues from patients. The expression of IL-34 was enhanced by cytotoxic chemotherapy in ovarian cancer cell lines and cancer tissues from chemotherapy-treated ovarian cancer patients. Importantly, high IL-34 expression correlated with worse progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival in different cohorts. The assessment of PFS based on a combination between IL34 expression and other related genes such as CSF1R and CD163 helped further to reach more statistical significance compared with IL34 alone. Furthermore, in the murine ovarian cancer cell HM-1 in vivo model, it was suggested that IL-34-derived tumor cells was correlated with tumor progression and survival by modulating the immune environment. Collectively, these findings indicate a possible correlation between IL-34 expression and disease progression in ovarian cancer patients and the mouse model.

Construction of a hypoxia-immune-related prognostic model and targeted therapeutic strategies for cervical cancer

Abstract Emerging evidence indicates that hypoxia and immunity play important roles in tumorigenesis and development. However, the hypoxia-immune-related prognostic risk model has not been established in cervical cancer (CC). We aimed to construct a hypoxia-immune-related prognostic risk model, which has potential application in predicting the prognosis of CC patients and the response to targeted therapy. The RNA-seq data and corresponding clinical information were retrieved from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database. The hypoxia status and immune status of CC patients were evaluated using the Consensus Clustering method and single-sample gene set enrichment analysis (ssGSEA), respectively. The univariate Cox regression, least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) and multivariate Cox regression were applied to establish the prognostic risk model of CC. The chemotherapy response for six chemotherapeutic agents of each CC patient was calculated according to the Genomics of Drug Sensitivity in Cancer (GDSC). And the Connectivity Map (CMap) database was performed to screen candidate small-molecule drugs. In this study, we identified seven gene signatures (P4HA2, MSMO1, EGLN1, ZNF316, IKZF3, ISCU and MYO1B) with prognostic values. And the survival time of patients with low risk was significantly longer than those with high risk. Meanwhile, CC patients in the high-risk group yielded higher sensitivity to five chemotherapeutic agents. And we listed 10 candidate small-molecule drugs that exhibited a high correlation with the prognosis of CC. Thus, the prognostic model can accurately predict the prognosis of patients with CC and may be helpful for the development of new hypoxia-immune prognostic markers and therapeutic strategies for CC.

Oligoclonal expansion of IgG+ B cells along with Tfh cell response is associated with a better outcome in endometrial cancer

Abstract B cells play a critical role in tumor immunity, with their presence associated with improved prognosis in various cancers, including endometrial cancer (EC). However, the nature of the B-cell response within the tumor microenvironment (TME) remains incompletely understood. In this study, we conducted single-cell analyses of B cells and CD4+ T cells in the TME of EC. We found that the TME of EC harbored abundant plasmablasts and plasma cells (PCs), which were rare in normal endometria. PCs primarily expressed either IgG or IgA, and a high abundance of IgG in TME was associated with better overall survival. B-cell receptor (BCR) repertoire analysis revealed a clonal expansion of IgG+ B cells, coinciding with an increased presence of T follicular helper (Tfh) cells in the TME. Notably, Tfh cells shared T-cell receptor clones with cycling CD4+ T cells, indicating local proliferation. BCR repertoire analysis also suggested that IgG+ PCs differentiate from IFN-responding B cells and double-negative B cells in the TME. Additionally, recombinant oligoclonal IgG antibodies were found to recognize antigens expressed by tumor cells as well as normal endometrial cells. Collectively, our study shows that the clonal expansion of IgG+ B cells, along with the Tfh cell response, is associated with a better outcome in EC.

PD-1+ Tim3+ tumor-infiltrating CD8 T cells sustain the potential for IFN-γ production, but lose cytotoxic activity in ovarian cancer

Abstract Persistent exposure to tumor antigens results in exhausted tumor-infiltrating T cells (TILs) that express the immune checkpoint molecules, PD-1 and Tim3, and lack anti-tumor immunity. To examine the exhausted status of TILs in ovarian cancer, the potential for cytokine production, proliferation and cytotoxicity by purified PD-1+ Tim3+ CD8 TILs was assessed. The production of IFN-γ and TNF-α by PD-1+ Tim3+ CD8 TILs remained the same in an intracellular cytokine staining assay and was higher in a cytokine catch assay than that by PD-1− Tim3− and PD-1+ Tim3− CD8 TILs. %Ki67+ was higher in PD-1+ Tim3+ CD8 TILs than in PD-1− Tim3− CD8 TILs. However, patients with high PD-1+ Tim3+ CD8 TILs had a poor prognosis. The potential for cytotoxicity was then examined. %Perforin+ and %granzyme B+ were lower in PD-1+ Tim3+ CD8 TILs than in PD-1− Tim3− and PD-1+ Tim3− CD8 TILs. To observe the potential for direct cytotoxicity by T cells, a target cell line expressing membrane-bound anti-CD3scFv was newly established and a cytotoxic assay targeting these cells was performed. The cytotoxicity of PD-1+ Tim3+ CD8 TILs was significantly lower than that of PD-1− Tim3− and PD-1+ Tim3− CD8 TILs. Even though PD-1+ Tim3+ CD8 TILs in ovarian cancer showed a sustained potential for cytokine production and proliferation, cytotoxicity was markedly impaired, which may contribute to the poor prognosis of patients with ovarian cancer. Among the impaired functions of exhausted TILs, cytotoxicity may be an essential target for cancer immunotherapy.