title: Radiation for Awakening the Dormant Immune System, a Promising Challenge to be Explored.
abstract: Recent advances that have been made in our understanding of cancer biology and immunology show that infiltrated immune cells and cytokines in the tumor microenvironment may play different functions that appear tightly related to clinical outcomes. Strategies aimed at interfering with the cross-talk between microenvironment tumor cells and their cellular partners have been considered for the development of new immunotherapies. These novel therapies target different cell components of the tumor microenvironment and importantly, they may be coupled and boosted with classical treatments, such as radiotherapy. In this work, we try to summarize recent data on the microenvironment impact of radiation therapy, from pre-clinical research to the clinic, while taking into account that this new knowledge will probably translate into indication and objective of radiation therapy changes in the next future.
authors.affiliation: Clinical Oncology Department, Virgen Macarena University Hospital , Seville , Spain.
authors.forename: Luis
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: de la Cruz-Merino
authors.affiliation: Radiotherapy Department, Virgen Macarena University Hospital , Seville , Spain.
authors.forename: Ana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Illescas-Vacas
authors.affiliation: Clinical Oncology Department, Virgen Macarena University Hospital , Seville , Spain.
authors.forename: Ana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Grueso-López
authors.affiliation: Biochemistry Department, Virgen Macarena University Hospital , Seville , Spain.
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Barco-Sánchez
authors.affiliation: Radiotherapy Department, Virgen Macarena University Hospital , Seville , Spain.
authors.forename: Carlos
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Míguez-Sánchez
keywords: CTLA-4; abscopal effect; immunotherapy; radiotherapy effects; tumor microenvironment