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. 2017 Jan 13;17(1):8.
doi: 10.1186/s12894-016-0195-x.

PD-L1 expression in papillary renal cell carcinoma

Takanobu Motoshima  1   2 , Yoshihiro Komohara  3 , Chaoya Ma  1 , Arni Kusuma Dewi  1   4 , Hirotsugu Noguchi  5 , Sohsuke Yamada  5 , Toshiyuki Nakayama  5 , Shohei Kitada  6 , Yoshiaki Kawano  2 , Wataru Takahashi  2 , Masaaki Sugimoto  7   8 , Motohiro Takeya  2 , Naohiro Fujimoto  6 , Yoshinao Oda  7 , Masatoshi Eto  2   8
Affiliations

PD-L1 expression in papillary renal cell carcinoma

Takanobu Motoshima et al. BMC Urol. .

Abstract

Background: The immune escape or tolerance of cancer cells is considered to be closely involved in cancer progression. Programmed death-1 (PD-1) is an inhibitory receptor expressed on activating T cells, and several types of cancer cells were found to express PD-1 ligand 1 (PD-L1) and ligand 2 (PD-L2).

Methods: In the present study, we investigated PD-L1/2 expression in papillary renal cell carcinoma (pRCC).

Result: We found PD-L1 expression in 29 of 102 cases, but no PD-L2 expression was seen. PD-L1 expression was not significantly correlated with any clinicopathological factor, including progression-free survival and overall survival. The frequency of PD-L1-positive cases was higher in type 2 (36%) than in type 1 (22%) pRCC; however, there was no significant difference in the percentages of score 0 cases (p value = 0.084 in Chi-square test). The frequency of high PD-L1 expression cases was higher in type 2 (23%) than in type 1 (11%), and the frequency of high PD-L1 expression cases was higher in grade 3/4 (21%) than in grade 1/2 (13%). However, no significant association was found between PD-L1 expression and all clinicopathological factors in pRCC.

Conclusion: High expression of PD-L1 in cancer cells was potentially associated to highly histological grade of malignancy in pRCC. The evaluation of the PD-L1 protein might still be useful for predicting the efficacy of anti-cancer immunotherapy using immuno-checkpoint inhibitors, however, not be useful for predicting the clinical prognosis.

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Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
PD-L1/2 expression in pRCC a Pictures of immunostaining of PD-L1/2 in two cell lines (PD-L1/2-positive cell line; ATL-T, PD-L1/2-negative cell line; DAUDI) b Pictures of H.E. staining and immunostaining of PD-L1 in 2 cases of pRCC. Positive signals are detected most strongly in cancer cells c Positive signals for PD-L1 are also detected in macrophages d Positive signals for PD-L1 are also detected in neuronal fibers e PD-L2 is detected in dendritic cells in the lymph node, whereas no PD-L2 is observed in the cancer cells of any of the pRCC cases
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
The frequencies of scores 0, 1, and 2 in pRCC. Cases were divided into two groups by histological subtype (a) or nuclear grade (b), and the frequencies of scores 0, 1, and 2 are shown
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Kaplan-Meier analysis of cancer-specific overall survival and progression-free survival
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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