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Review
. 2018 Feb;73(2):328-340.
doi: 10.1111/all.13311. Epub 2017 Oct 5.

AllergoOncology: Opposite outcomes of immune tolerance in allergy and cancer

Affiliations
Review

AllergoOncology: Opposite outcomes of immune tolerance in allergy and cancer

E Jensen-Jarolim et al. Allergy. 2018 Feb.

Abstract

While desired for the cure of allergy, regulatory immune cell subsets and nonclassical Th2-biased inflammatory mediators in the tumour microenvironment can contribute to immune suppression and escape of tumours from immunological detection and clearance. A key aim in the cancer field is therefore to design interventions that can break immunological tolerance and halt cancer progression, whereas on the contrary allergen immunotherapy exactly aims to induce tolerance. In this position paper, we review insights on immune tolerance derived from allergy and from cancer inflammation, focusing on what is known about the roles of key immune cells and mediators. We propose that research in the field of AllergoOncology that aims to delineate these immunological mechanisms with juxtaposed clinical consequences in allergy and cancer may point to novel avenues for therapeutic interventions that stand to benefit both disciplines.

Keywords: allergooncology; allergy; cancer; oncoimmunology; tolerance.

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Conflict of interest statement

Statement

All authors have read and approved the position paper. None of the authors has any conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Immune infiltration in a human breast carcinoma. Triple negative breast cancer residual tumour section shows infiltration of different immune cell populations in tumour stroma: CD4+ and CD8+ T cells, CD20 B cells FoxP3+ activated lymphocytes and CD68+ macrophages (CD4 (green), CD8 (red), CD20 (yellow), FoxP3 (magenta), CD68 (cyan), nuclei (blue)). The section was stained with the OPAL-7 Solid Immunology Kit and imaged on a Vectra Quantitative Pathology Workstation. Scale bar: 20μm.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Schematic depicting the inverse proportionality between cancer and allergy outcomes in two different scenarios: immune tolerance and active immunity. Cell subsets and soluble mediators involved in immune tolerance and active immunity may be responsible for the shift of the balance towards “controlled allergic disease”/“tumor progression” or “enhanced allergic response”/“tumor suppression”. Key: Dendritic Cell (DC), Mast Cell (MC), Innate Lymphoid cell (ILC), Regulatory T cell (TREG), Regulatory B cell (BREG), M1/2 Macrophage (M1/2), CTL (TC), T helper cell (TH), lipocalin 2 (LCN2).

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