Volume 4 Issue 1, January 2023

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a heterogeneous disease with poor prognosis and treatment options. A new study reveals a unique inflammatory signature in pediatric and adult AML malignant cells that is associated with the infiltration of atypical B cells in the bone marrow microenvironment, which adds an independent layer of prognostic information.

Patients with blood cancer have fewer antibodies after SARS-CoV-2 vaccination — but recent work shows that these antibodies seem to bind to viral spike protein more strongly than those in matched controls. In addition, another study finds that convalescent or vaccinee plasma might improve COVID-19 outcomes in those with blood cancer.

Modulation of T cell immune checkpoints combined with inhibition of chemokine receptors on myeloid-derived suppressor cells can reprogram the highly suppressive tumor immune microenvironment of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), and generates durable complete responses in a PDAC mouse model. These results provide a testable clinical regimen for human PDAC.

Piccolo and colleagues discuss the current knowledge on YAP/TAZ biology in cancer, highlighting recent progress in the field and discussing open questions, as well as potential clinical implications.

Lasry and Nadorp et al. use single-cell RNA sequencing and CITE sequencing to reveal inflammatory gene expression in a subset of pediatric and adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia that associates with changes in the immune microenvironment and generate an inflammatory score with prognostic potential.

Qiu et al. show that chronic interferon (IFN) stimulation establishes an epigenetic signature of inflammatory memory in tumor cells, resulting in elevated levels of IFN-stimulated genes that sustain immune cell dysfunction when IFN is low.

Gulhati et al. demonstrate therapeutic efficacy for combinatorial administration of 41BB agonist, LAG3 antagonist and a CXCR1/2 inhibitor in murine pancreatic cancer models, resulting in a remodeled tumor microenvironment.

Keppler and colleagues show that individuals with hematological cancers rapidly develop potent infection-neutralizing antibodies and a robust T cell response against several SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern in response to mRNA vaccination.

Müller-Tidow and colleagues perform a randomized clinical trial and show that administration of convalescent plasma improves COVID-19 outcome in patients with cancer who are unable to generate an adequate immune response.

Oh and colleagues demonstrate that the DUSP6–RSK1 axis is involved in the transformation of myeloproliferative neoplasms to secondary acute myeloid leukemia and that DUSP6 mediates the response to JAK2 inhibition.

Perou and colleagues perform genomic, transcriptomic and epigenetic analyses on pairs of primary and metastatic breast tumors, detecting subtype switching and changes in immune signatures and DNA methylation patterns associated with metastasis.