Jeffrey M. Lemons, MD, of the University of Chicago, discusses early safety and efficacy findings from a small study on pembrolizumab and multiorgan-site ablative stereotactic body radiotherapy in patients with advanced solid tumors (Abstract 20).
James L. Gulley, MD, PhD, of the National Cancer Institute, discusses combined treatment approaches showing early evidence of clinical activity: agents such as vaccines or PARP inhibitors that can initiate an immune response, paired with agents such as checkpoint inhibitors that can facilitate the activity of tumor-directed immune cells.
Aaron Goodman, MD, of the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, discusses an analysis of more than 100,000 patients with cancer for CD274 (PD-L1) amplification and the implications for treatment with immune checkpoint blockade (Abstract 47).
Mary L. Disis, MD, of the University of Washington, discusses innate and adaptive immune system cells, T cells as key to mediating antitumor immunity, and the mechanisms by which cancer evades the immune system.
Sumanta K. Pal, MD, of the City of Hope, discusses immunotherapy as a front-line treatment for kidney cancer and the strategy of VEGF blockade with immunotherapy, which is emerging as a possible treatment modality.
Kristen Fousek, PhD Candidate at Baylor College of Medicine, discusses her preclinical work on targeting CD19-negative relapsed B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, using CAR T cells that target three antigens simultaneously, a technique that addresses the growing problem of relapse (Abstract 121).
