Cancer Immunotherapies: From Laboratory to Clinical Studies

Dear Colleagues,

Immunotherapy is a potential cancer treatment aiming to boost or change the immune system in order to fight cancer. In the past few years, significant progresses have been made in this field developing several major types of immunotherapy applied in cancer care. Despite this success, immunotherapy only works in a subset of cancers, and only a fraction of patients with cancer respond to immunotherapy. Ongoing efforts to improve our understanding of tumor immunology and the roles of the immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment are necessary to provide insights into developing more effective therapies. Combination therapies using checkpoint inhibitors with personalized cancer vaccines and novel targeted therapies directed at the tumor microenvironment and the host microbiome could be the future of cancer immunotherapy. In this context, the interface between clinicians and laboratory is crucial to allow oncologists to make the best choice of treatment for the patient and to evaluate the clinical outcome of therapy. Clinical trials testing rational immunotherapy combinations that include biomarker analysis will accelerate clinical progress, moving to effective immunotherapy in the treatment of several type of cancers. The aim of this Special Issue is to publish original research and review articles related to recent progresses in clinical cancer immunotherapy, including in vivo and in vitro studies aiming at the identification and exploration of novel targets, novel strategies and biomarkers covering several facets of immunotherapy techniques.

Dr. Alessandra Carcereri De Prati
Dr. Zong Sheng Guo
Topic Editors