CCL2

Cancer

Internal medicine

Chemokine receptor

Chemokine

Receptor

Immunology

CCR2

T cell

Combination therapy

Immunotherapy

Blockade

Immune checkpoint

PD-L1

Cancer research

Medicine

Immune system

Pharmacology

Communications Biology

Immunotherapies targeting the PD-1/PD-L1 axis are now a mainstay in the clinical management of multiple cancer types, however, many tumors still fail to respond. CCL2 is highly expressed in various cancer types and has been shown to be associated with poor prognosis. Inhibition or blockade of the CCL2/CCR2 signaling axis has thus been an area of interest for cancer therapy. Here we show across multiple murine tumor and metastasis models that CCR2 antagonism in combination with anti-PD-1 therapy leads to sensitization and enhanced tumor response over anti-PD-1 monotherapy. We show that enhanced treatment response correlates with enhanced CD8 + T cell recruitment and activation and a concomitant decrease in CD4 + regulatory T cell. These results provide strong preclinical rationale for further clinical exploration of combining CCR2 antagonism with PD-1/PD-L1-directed immunotherapies across multiple tumor types especially given the availability of small molecule CCR2 inhibitors and antibodies.

Inhibition of the CCL2 receptor, CCR2, enhances tumor response to immune checkpoint therapy