ArticleJournal for immunotherapy of cancer2019
Metastatic breast cancers have reduced immune cell recruitment but harbor increased macrophages relative to their matched primary tumors.
Article in Journal for immunotherapy of cancer, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 66 papers.
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Who cites it
66 citing papers in PubMed, 123 citations in OpenAlex.
- The immune microenvironment and relation to outcome in patients with advanced breast cancer treated with docetaxel with or without gemcitabine.Oncoimmunology · 2021Trial
- The immunology of human breast cancer.Nature reviews. Immunology · 2026Review
- Breast cancer ovarian metastases show increased activity of GPCR pathways.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Observational
- RET signaling as a mediator of estrogen receptor positive breast cancer brain metastasis.Communications biology · 2026Article
- Characterization, immune cell phenotyping and differential gene expression analysis of brain metastases and primary breast cancer samples.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Programmable local immunochemotherapy for triple-negative breast cancer via spatiotemporally controlled release of CpG oligodeoxynucleotides, gemcitabine, and paclitaxel.NPJ breast cancer · 2026Article
- Cancer cell-monocyte co-culture spheroids recapitulate pro-tumorigenic, immunosuppressive, and drug-resistant microenvironments in brain metastatic breast cancer.NPJ breast cancer · 2025Article
- A CSF-1R inhibitor both prevents and treats triple-negative breast cancer brain metastases in hematogenous preclinical models.Clinical & experimental metastasis · 2025Article
- Single-cell profiling of bone metastasis ecosystems from multiple cancer types reveals convergent and divergent mechanisms of bone colonization.Cell genomics · 2025Article
- Distant Metastases of Breast Cancer Resemble Primary Tumors in Cancer Cell Composition but Differ in Immune Cell Phenotypes.Cancer research · 2025Article
- Immunomodulatory peptide-drug conjugate MEL-dKLA suppresses progression of prostate cancer by eliminating M2-like tumor-associated macrophages.Frontiers in immunology · 2025Article
- Organ-Specific Immune Setpoints Underlie Divergent Immune Profiles across Metastatic Sites in Breast Cancer.Cancer immunology research · 2024Article
- Macrophage diversity in cancer dissemination and metastasis.Cellular & molecular immunology · 2024Review
- mDia2 is an important mediator of MRTF-A-dependent regulation of breast cancer cell migration.Molecular biology of the cell · 2024Article
- Liver tropism of ER mutant breast cancer is characterized by unique molecular changes and immune infiltration.Breast cancer research and treatment · 2024Article
- Unravelling immune microenvironment features underlying tumor progression in the single-cell era.Cancer cell international · 2024Review
- Macrophage heterogeneity in bone metastasis.Journal of bone oncology · 2024Article
- Unique macrophage phenotypes activated by BMP signaling in breast cancer bone metastases.JCI insight · 2024Article
- Characterization of immunomodulating agents from Staphylococcus aureus for priming immunotherapy in triple-negative breast cancers.Scientific reports · 2024Article
6 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issuedCorrection:2020
Authors and funding
22 authors at 7 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
The interplay between the immune system and tumor progression is well recognized. However, current human breast cancer immunophenotyping studies are mostly focused on primary tumors with metastatic breast cancer lesions remaining largely understudied. To address this gap, we examined exome-capture RNA sequencing data from 50 primary breast tumors (PBTs) and their patient-matched metastatic tumors (METs) in brain, ovary, bone and gastrointestinal tract. We used gene expression signatures as surrogates for tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) and compared TIL patterns in PBTs and METs. Enrichment analysis and deconvolution methods both revealed that METs had a significantly lower abundance of total immune cells, including CD8+ T cells, regulatory T cells and dendritic cells. An exception was M2-like macrophages, which were significantly higher in METs across the organ sites examined. Multiplex immunohistochemistry results were consistent with data from the in-silico analysis and showed increased macrophages in METs. We confirmed the finding of a significant reduction in immune cells in brain METs (BRMs) by pathologic assessment of TILs in a set of 49 patient-matched pairs of PBT/BRMs. These findings indicate that METs have an overall lower infiltration of immune cells relative to their matched PBTs, possibly due to immune escape. RNAseq analysis suggests that the relative levels of M2-like macrophages are increased in METs, and their potential role in promoting breast cancer metastasis warrants further study.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.