Pre-Existing Immunity to Oncolytic Virus Potentiates Its Immunotherapeutic Efficacy

Abstract

Anti-viral immunity presents a major hurdle for systemically-administered oncolytic viruses (OV). Intratumoral OV therapy has a potential to overcome this problem through activation of anti-tumor immune response, with local and abscopal effects. However, the effects of anti-viral immunity in such a setting are still not well defined. Using Newcastle Disease Virus (NDV) as a model, we explore the effects of pre-existing anti-viral immunity on therapeutic efficacy in syngeneic mouse tumor models. Unexpectedly, we find that while pre-existing immunity to NDV limits its replication in tumors, tumor clearance, abscopal effects and survival are not compromised and, on the contrary, are superior in NDV-immunized mice, both in a setting of NDV monotherapy and in combination with systemic CTLA-4 blockade. These findings demonstrate that pre-existing immunity to NDV may increase its therapeutic efficacy through potentiation of systemic anti-tumor immunity, which provides clinical rationale for repeated therapeutic dosing and prompts investigation of such effects with other OVs.