Editor: Annette Paschen, Beatrice Thier

Date: 18/07/2022

Melanoma is highly aggressive and one of the most lethal types of skin cancer. Distinct immune-modulatory drugs are currently tested in clinical trials for treatment of advanced metastatic disease, aiming to enhance adaptive anti-tumor immune responses. A major obstacle in melanoma therapy is resistance to adaptive anti-tumor immunity, which has repeatedly been associated with the enormous plasticity of melanoma cells. The concomitant capacity to remodel their cell phenotype enables melanoma cells to persist under selective immune pressure by transition into a non-proliferative cell state. In this study, Thier et al. demonstrate that in response to specific immune-modulatory drug treatment melanoma cells reversibly switch from a proliferative, differentiated towards a growth-arrested, dedifferentiated persister cell state. But, in contrast to the current concepts, melanoma cell dedifferentiation did not establish a barrier to effective anti-tumor immune responses. For details please see…

Thier B, Zhao F, Stupia S, et al. Innate immune receptor signaling induces transient melanoma dedifferentiation while preserving immunogenicity. Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer 2022;10:e003863. doi: 10.1136/jitc-2021-003863.

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