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Clinicopathological factors associated with tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte reactivity in breast cancer

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Cancer Immunology, Immunotherapy Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Background

The clinical significance of adoptive tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) therapy has been demonstrated in many clinical trials. We analyzed the in vitro reactivity of cultured TILs against autologous breast cancer cells.

Methods

TILs and cancer cells were cultured from 31 breast tumor tissues. Reactivity of TILs against cancer cells was determined by measuring secreted interferon-gamma. Expression levels of epithelial markers, major histocompatibility complex molecules, and programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) in cancer cells, and T cell markers (memory, T cell activation and exhaustion, and regulatory T cell markers) in expanded TILs were analyzed and compared between the reactive and non-reactive groups.

Results

In seven cases, TILs showed reactivity to autologous cancer cells. Six of these cases were associated with triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC). All reactive TNBCs were derived from surgical specimens after neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC). Higher expression of Ki67 in tumor tissues and lower expression of PD-L1 in cultured cancer cells were associated with reactivity. Proliferation of reactive TILs was high. High proportions of T cells and PD-1+CD4+ and PD1+CD8+ T cells were associated with reactivity in TNBC cases, while other activation or exhaustion markers were not.

Conclusion

TILs from approximately half the TNBC cases with NAC showed reactivity against autologous cancer cells. The proportion of PD-1+ T cells was higher in the reactive group. Adoptive TIL therapy combined with PD-1 inhibitors might be promising for TNBC patients with residual tumors after NAC.

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Availability of data and materials

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Abbreviations

ACT:

Adoptive cell transfer

CK:

Cytokeratin

EpCAM:

Epithelial cell adhesion molecule

ER:

Estrogen receptor

HER2+ :

Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-positive

HR:

Hormone receptor

IFN-γ:

Interferon-gamma

MDSCs:

Myeloid-derived suppressor cells

MHC:

Major histocompatibility complex

NAC:

Neoadjuvant chemotherapy

NK:

Natural killer

NKT:

Natural killer T

PBMC:

Peripheral blood mononuclear cell

PDX:

Patient-derived xenograft

PR:

Progesterone receptor

REP:

Rapid expansion

TCR:

T cell receptor

TIL:

Tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte

TLS:

Tertiary lymphoid structure

TNBC:

Triple-negative breast cancer

Treg:

Regulatory T cell

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Funding

This study was supported by the Korean Health Technology R&D Project, Ministry of Health & Welfare (HI15C0708 and HI17C0337) and the Asan Institute for Life Sciences, Asan Medical Center, Seoul, Korea (2018IL0169, 2019IL0169, and 2019IL0839).

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Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Contributions

HjL interpreted the data associated with tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte reactivity in breast cancer and was a major contributor in writing the manuscript. YAK and HSP participated in sample preparation and analysis. YK and JHS analyzed the TCR repertoire of the TILs. HL, GG, and HJL contributed as pathologists and revised the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Gyungyub Gong or Hee Jin Lee.

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Ethics approval and consents to participate

Tumor tissues were obtained from patients along with their consent to the use of the specimen for research purposes. This study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of Asan Medical Center (IRB#2015-0438).

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Not applicable.

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Lee, H., Kim, YA., Kim, Y. et al. Clinicopathological factors associated with tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte reactivity in breast cancer. Cancer Immunol Immunother 69, 2381–2391 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00262-020-02633-5

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