Abstract
Abstract Immunotherapeutics represent highly promising agents with the potential to improve patient outcomes in a variety of cancer types. Unfortunately, single-agent immunotherapy has achieved limited clinical benefit to date in patients suffering from pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). This may be due to the presence of a uniquely immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME) present in PDACs, which creates a barrier to effective immune surveillance. Critical obstacles to immunotherapy in PDAC tumors include the dense desmoplastic stroma that acts as a barrier to T-cell infiltration and the high numbers of tumor-associated immunosuppressive cells. We have identified hyperactivated focal adhesion kinase (FAK) activity in neoplastic PDAC cells as a significant regulator of the fibrotic and immunosuppressive TME. We found that FAK activity was elevated in human PDAC tissues and correlates with high levels of fibrosis and poor CD8+ cytotoxic T-cell infiltration. Single-agent FAK inhibition (VS-4718) significantly limited tumor progression, resulting in a doubling of survival in the p48-Cre/LSL-KrasG12D/p53Flox/+ (KPC) mouse model of human PDAC. This alteration in tumor progression was associated with dramatically reduced tumor fibrosis, decreased numbers of tumor-infiltrating immature myeloid cells, and immunosuppressive macrophages. We postulated that these desirable effects of FAK inhibition on the TME might render PDAC tumors more sensitive to immunotherapy. Accordingly, we found that FAK inhibition rendered the previously unresponsive KPC mouse model responsive to anti-PD1 and anti-CTLA4 antagonists, leading to a near tripling of survival times. These data suggest that FAK inhibition increases immune surveillance by overcoming the fibrotic and immunosuppressive PDAC TME and thus renders tumors responsive to immunotherapy. To test this hypothesis in human PDAC patients, we have opened a phase I clinical trial testing the safety and impact on the tumor microenvironment of the FAK inhibitor defactinib, in combination with pembrolizumab and gemcitabine (NCT02546531). These studies are ongoing in patients with advanced cancer, including metastatic PDAC. Early biomarker studies on PDAC tissue collected pre- and post-therapy suggest that this combination impacts the immunosuppressive TME. Citation Format: David G. Denardo. Reprogramming the tumor microenvironment to improve responses to therapy [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr SY06-03. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-SY06-03
Published Version
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