OncoImmunology (Jan 2021)

Cancer-specific type-I interferon receptor signaling promotes cancer stemness and effector CD8+ T-cell exhaustion

  • Wang Gong,
  • Christopher R. Donnelly,
  • Blake R. Heath,
  • Emily Bellile,
  • Lorenza A. Donnelly,
  • Hülya F. Taner,
  • Luke Broses,
  • J. Chad Brenner,
  • Steven B. Chinn,
  • Ru-Rong Ji,
  • Haitao Wen,
  • Jacques E. Nör,
  • Jie Wang,
  • Gregory T. Wolf,
  • Yuying Xie,
  • Yu Leo Lei

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/2162402X.2021.1997385
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 10, no. 1

Abstract

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Type-I interferon (IFN-I) signaling is critical to maintaining antigen-presenting cell function for anti-tumor immunity. However, recent studies have suggested that IFN-I signaling may also contribute to more aggressive phenotypes, raising the possibility that IFN-I downstream signaling in cancer and myeloid cells may exert dichotomous functions.We analyzed the clinicopathologic correlation of cancer-specific IFN-I activation in 195 head and neck squamous cell carcinoma patients. We also characterized the immune impact of IFN-I receptor (IFNAR1)-deficiency in syngeneic tumor models using biochemistry, flow cytometry, and single-cell RNA-Seq. We stained HNSCC tissue microarrays with a sensitive IFN-I downstream signaling activation marker, MX1, and quantitated cancer cell-specific MX1 staining. Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed that MX1-high tumors exhibited worse survival, a phenotype that depends on the number of CD8+ intratumoral T-cells. We found that cancer-specific IFNAR1 engagement promotes cancer stemness and higher expression levels of suppressive immune checkpoint receptor ligands in cancer-derived exosomes. Notably, mice bearing Ifnar1-deficient tumors exhibited lower tumor burden, increased T-cell infiltration, reduced exhausted CD4+PD1high T-cells, and increased effector population CD8+IFN-γ+ T-cells. Then, we performed single-cell RNA-sequencing and discovered that cancer-specific IFN-I signaling not only restricts effector cells expansion but also dampens their functional fitness.The beneficial role of IFN-I activation is largely dependent on the myeloid compartment. Cancer-specific IFN-I receptor engagement promotes cancer stemness and the release of cancer-derived exosomes with high expression levels of immune checkpoint receptor ligands. Cancer-specific IFN-I activation is associated with poor immunogenicity and worse clinical outcomes in HNSCC.

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