Immune checkpoint inhibitors win the 2018 Nobel Prize

Abstract

The 2018 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Tasuku Honjo and James Allison for their discoveries in cancer immunology. Professor Honjo was awarded due to his discovery of the programmed death molecule-1 (PD-1) on T cells. Professor Allison discovered another important immunosuppressive molecule: cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen-4 (CTLA-4). Suppression of T cell activation by PD-1 and/or CTLA-4 is considered one of the major escape mechanisms of cancer cells. Inhibition of these molecules by immune checkpoint inhibitors can successfully activate the immune system to fight cancer. Checkpoint inhibitors have brought about a major breakthrough in cancer immunotherapy, reviving the hope of curing patients with end-stage cancer, including a wide variety of cancer types. In metastatic malignant melanoma, the previous long-term survival of only 5% can now be extended to 50% with anti-PD-1 plus anti-CTLA-4 combined treatment in the latest report. More checkpoint molecules such as lymphocyte-activation gene 3 and T cell immunoglobulin and mucin domain 3 are under investigation. The achievement of Drs. Honjo and Allison in cancer immunotherapy has encouraged research into other immune-pathological diseases.

Ontological modeling and analysis of experimentally or clinically verified drugs against coronavirus infection

“…Here we would like to propose an “HCI checkpoint cocktail” strategy that targets to interrupt the important checkpoints in the dynamic host-coronavirus interaction (HCI) network. Inspired by the immune checkpoint theory for cancer immunotherapy 48 , the checkpoint here denotes a key point in the dynamic HCI network where a major biological and/or regulatory process is performed. For COVID-19, the host-coronavirus interaction network includes two parts: coronaviral pathogenesis and host immune responses; each part is indeed a network containing many checkpoints.…”

Testing for latent tuberculosis before starting patients on immune checkpoint inhibitors

“…The 2018 Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology was awarded to Tasuku Honjo and James Allison for their discovery of ICPIs, a revolutionary new cancer therapy. [1] An important yet often overlooked phenomena when using ICPIs though is the risk of infection reactivation due to immunosuppression. Activation of asymptomatic and undiagnosed LTB is a significant concern as demonstrated by multiple case studies.…”

Treatment Combinations with DNA Vaccines for the Treatment of Metastatic Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer (mCRPC)

“…One of the most exciting areas in cancer immunotherapy has been immune checkpoint blockade, with the 2018 Nobel Prize in Medicine awarded to James Allison and Tasuku Honjo for their roles in the discovery of two targets for immune checkpoint therapy, CTLA-4 and PD-1 [ 93 ]. CTLA-4 (or CD152) is expressed on T cells and competes with CD80/86 to prevent the costimulation of CD8+ T cells and inhibit T cell activation [ 94 ].…”