A molecular profile of T-cell exhaustion in cancer

Abstract

The first gene profiling study of cancer-specific CD8+ T-cells demonstrates that lymphocyte dysfunction in cancer tissue is due to multiple molecular alterations,1 similar as in "exhausted" T-cells in chronic infection.2 The data suggest novel drug targets, and show that T-cell exhaustion is reversible and limited to anatomical sites of disease. © 2012 Landes Bioscience.