Witch hunt against tumor cells enhanced by dendritic cells

Conventional cancer treatments mediate their effects via the direct elimination of tumor cells. Nonetheless, recent evidence indicates that radiotherapy and some chemotherapeutic agents can also induce specific immune responses that contribute to therapeutic outcomes. Two major tumor-intrinsic changes that determine the immune response against tumors have been identified: the translocation of calreticulin to the plasma membrane and the release of high-mobility group box 1 protein. Together, these changes improve engulfment and processing of apoptotic bodies by dendritic cells, which are involved in the cross-priming of antitumor T lymphocytes in vivo. We review these two molecular mechanisms that dictate the radio/chemotherapy-elicited antitumor immune response and discuss how this knowledge can be clinically exploited to predict and also ameliorate the success of chemo/radiotherapy.