Breast cancer future or investigational therapies

Immunotherapeutic interventions

Generally, cancer immunotherapy refers to immune checkpoint inhibitors and cytokines, adoptive cell therapy, and cancer vaccines.

Immune checkpoint inhibitors

Programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1)

• Programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) is an inhibitory immune checkpoint inhibitor that limits T-cell effector function within tissues, and it is expressed on the surfaces of immune effector cells (T-cells, B cells, NK cells, DCs, and many TILs)and has two known ligands, namely, PD-L1 and PD-L2.

• Anti-PD-1 antibodies (Pembrolizumab, JS001, PDR001, and Nivolumab)
• Anti-PD-L1 antibodies (Atezolizumab and Durvalumab)

Anti-CTLA-4 antibodies (Ipilimumab and Tremelimumab)

• Cytotoxic T lymphocyte-associated protein 4 (CTLA-4) is a T-cell inhibitory receptor that is expressed on activated CD8+ T cells and CD4+ regulatory T cells that express CD25 and Foxp3.

• Immune checkpoint inhibitors might be combined with targeted therapy (i.e Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and EGFR (epidermal growth factor receptor) inhibitors)

Adoptive cell therapy

• Adoptive cell therapy is defined as the induction of anti-tumor immune responses via the isolation of highly active and tumor-specific lymphocytes, such as TILs, cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs), Th cells, NK and DC cells.

• Chimeric antigen receptors T-cell-based therapy
• T cell receptors (TCRs)—engineered T cells

Cancer vaccines

• Cancer-testis antigens (CTA) as a vaccine target
• Personalized peptide vaccination (PPV)
• Antigen-presenting cell (APC) and DC-based tumor vaccination