Cancer immunotherapy is an unprecedented way of utilizing the body’s own immune system to fight tumors. However, only a relatively limited (~20%) fraction of patients can benefit from this treatment, including immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI)-based immunotherapy. A tumor that resists cancer immunotherapy, so-called ‘cold’ tumor, is generally with a poor reflection in cancer cell antigenicity and adjuvanticity, as well as a highly immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME) with limited infiltration by cytotoxic T cells (CTLs) and dendritic cells (DCs) coupled to the accumulation of various myeloid cell populations such as myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) and tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs) subsets. The remodeling of immunosuppressive TME has been considered as an important target for the development of combinatorial immunotherapeutic regimens with superior efficiency.
Recently, Professor Chao Wang of our institute, together with Researcher Jingrun Chen of School of Mathematical Sciences, Soochow University, and Professor Jianhong Chu of Institute of Blood and Marrow Transplantation of Soochow University fabricate different sizes of nano-formulations derived from yeast cell wall. The induction of anticancer immunity of our formulations appears to inversely correlate with their size due to the ability to accumulate in tumor-draining lymph node (TDLN). Moreover, the authors use a percolation model to explain their distribution behavior toward TDLN. The abundance and functional orientation of each effector component are significantly improved not only in the microenvironment in tumor but also in the TDLN following small size YCW NPs treatment. In combination with programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) blockade, the authors demonstrate anticancer efficiency in melanoma-challenged mice. The authors delineate potential strategy to target immunosuppressive microenvironment by microbe-based nanoparticles and highlight the role of size effect in microbe-based immune therapeutics.
Title: Yeast-derived nanoparticles remodel the immunosuppressive microenvironment in tumor and tumor-draining lymph nodes to suppress tumor growth
Authors: Jialu Xu, Qingle Ma, Yue Zhang, Ziying Fei, Yifei Sun, Qin Fan, Bo Liu, Jinyu Bai, Yue Yu, Jianhong Chu,* Jingrun Chen* & Chao Wang*
Link to paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-27750-2
Acknowledgement：We thank the graduate student interdisciplinary innovation training program of Soochow University. This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 31900988 C.W., 81770216 J.C., and 11971021 Jin.C.), the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (No. SBK2019040088 C.W.), Jiangsu Province Six Talent Peaks Project (No. SWYY-110 C.W.). This work was also supported by the Program for Jiangsu Specially-Appointed Professors to C.W. This work was partly supported by Collaborative Innovation Center of Suzhou Nano Science & Technology, the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (PAPD), the 111 Project. This work was partly supported by Undergraduate Training Program for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Soochow University (Project 201910285013Z).
Group page: http://web.suda.edu.cn/cwang/
Editor: Danting Xiang