Author(s) :

Diya Sammanna, Ashley N. Pearson.

Volume/Issue :

Abstract :

HPV-specific head and neck cancer (HNSCC) develops secondary to infection with the human papillomavirus (HPV). HNSCC mostly affects younger and older age groups who live in North America and Europe. T cells play a crucial role in identifying and killing cancer cells in an antigenspecific manner, but cancer cells often evade this natural immunologic detection system. Importantly, the impact of antigen-specific differentiation of T cells in HNSCC is unknown. In this paper, we hypothesized that the location of the tumor and expression of the marker PD-1 is associated with stronger T cell effector functions and T cell activation. To test this hypothesis, we analyzed single cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) for expression of gene programs associated with immunosuppression and T cell effector functions. We found that the lymph node had an increased expression of immunosuppressive genes and that PD-1+ T cells had increased expression of genes associated with effector functions. This work suggests that researchers should focus on improving T cell activation in the lymph node to enhance the anti-tumor immune response in HNSCC.