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Cancer

Antibodies regulate antitumour immunity

Nature volume 521, pages 35–37 (2015)Cite this article

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Boosting the T cells that mediate anticancer immune responses is a therapeutic goal. But T cells do not work alone — B cells and the antibodies they produce can both trigger and suppress the response. See Letters p.94 & p.99

Although cancers originate from cell-intrinsic genetic mutations, it has become clear that for malignant tumours to progress in an unrestrained fashion they must elude or subvert the host's immune system1. As a result, the best, and perhaps the only, option for curing cancer lies in enhancing these immunosurveillance mechanisms. This can be achieved by immunotherapies — treatments specifically designed to stimulate anticancer immunity2,3 — and through chemotherapies and radiotherapies that mediate their long-term effects by eliciting anticancer immunity4. Natural anticancer immune responses, as well as many forms of cancer immunotherapy, depend on the activity of T cells that recognize tumour-specific molecules (antigens)1,2; only rarely have anticancer effects been ascribed to the antibody-producing B cells of the humoral immune system5. But in this issue, Carmi et al.6 (page 99) and Shalapour et al.7 (page 94) reveal the potential of humoral immune responses to positively and negatively regulate T-cell-based anticancer immunity.

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Figure 1: Two opposing roles for B cells in cancer immunology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laurence Zitvogel is at the Gustave Roussy Comprehensive Cancer Center, 94805 Villejuif, France.,

    Laurence Zitvogel

  2. Guido Kroemer is at the Cordeliers Research Center of the University Paris Descartes, 75006 Paris, France, and at the Pôle de Biologie, Hôpital Européen Georges Pompidou, Paris.,

    Guido Kroemer

Authors
  1. Laurence Zitvogel
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  2. Guido Kroemer
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Correspondence to Guido Kroemer.

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Zitvogel, L., Kroemer, G. Antibodies regulate antitumour immunity. Nature 521, 35–37 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature14388

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