title: T cell anergy, exhaustion, senescence, and stemness in the tumor microenvironment.
abstract: Human tumors progress despite the presence of tumor associated antigen (TAA)-specific T cells. Many different molecular and cellular mechanisms contribute to the failure of T cells to eradicate the tumor. These include immune suppressive networks that impair ongoing T cell function and enable tumor escape. Recent studies have started to reveal the nature of effector T cells in the tumor microenvironment. In this article we discuss T cell anergy, exhaustion, senescence, and stemness, and review the phenotype of dysfunctional T cell subsets and the underlying molecular mechanisms in the tumor microenvironments. We suggest that targeting T cell dysfunctional mechanisms and introducing/promoting T cell stemness are important approaches to treat patients with cancer.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Ann Arbor, MI, United States.
authors.forename: Joel
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Crespo
authors.forename: Haoyu
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.forename: Theodore H
authors.initials: TH
authors.lastname: Welling
authors.forename: Zhigang
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Tian
authors.forename: Weiping
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zou
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D016922:Cellular Senescence; D017635:Clonal Anergy / Q000276:immunology*; D006801:Humans; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000276:immunology* / Q000628:therapy; D013234:Stem Cells / Q000276:immunology; D013601:T-Lymphocytes / Q000166:cytology / Q000276:immunology* / Q000473:pathology*; D059016:Tumor Microenvironment / Q000276:immunology*