What is the real role of CD40 in cancer immunotherapy?

✍ Scribed by Régis T. Costello; Jean-Albert Gastaut; Daniel Olive

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1999
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 182 KB
• Volume: 20
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0167-5699
• DOI: 10.1016/s0167-5699(99)01507-8

✦ Synopsis

ost human malignancies express tumour-associated or tumour-specific antigens (Ags) but do not elicit an efficient immune response. This could be rectified by increasing the presentation of exogenously processed tumour Ags by professional antigen-presenting cells (APCs) such as dendritic cells. Alternatively, the APC functions of cancer cells could be enhanced directly, improving both the presentation of endogenous peptides and the costimulatory signals they provide to T cells. Recently, the role of CD40 and its ligand (CD40L) in the modulation of tumour cell APC functions has been underlined. Here, we will summarize both the direct and indirect effects of tumour cell triggering via CD40, focusing on haematological malignancies of B-cell origin, a model of poorly immunogenic tumours that has provided a large amount of data. B-cell malignancies correspond to various differentiation stages of B-cell development, for which normal counterparts have been described (Box 1).