[Tumor/cytotoxic effector cross-talk in the control of tumor susceptibility to lysis]

Abstract

During the two least decades, the field of tumor immunology has met an expansion of knowledge about the molecular and cellular bases of immune regulation. The identification of cancer antigens has been of critical importance and cancer vaccine is at present a very fast moving field. However, the immunotherapy approaches in cancer are of modest success. This is mainly due to the capacity of tumor cells to escape from immunological detection and to resist to cell mediated cytotoxicity. We will discuss some mechanisms associated with the acquisition of this tumor resistance and the alteration of T cell function and how cancer profiling through genomics approaches may help to reconceptualize immunotherapy strategies.