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MINI REVIEW article
Front. Immunol.
Sec. Cancer Immunity and Immunotherapy
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2025.1582305
This article is part of the Research TopicCommunity Series in Immunological Precision Therapeutics: Integrating Multi-Omics Technologies and Comprehensive Approaches for Personalized Immune Intervention: Volume IIView all 9 articles
Immunosuppressive Tumor Microenvironment in Pancreatic Cancer: Mechanisms and Therapeutic Targets
Provisionally accepted- 1Department of Gastroenterology, Wenzhou Central Hospital, Wenzhou, China., Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, China
- 2Department of Gastroenterology, The Dingli Clinical College of Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, China., Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, China
- 3First College for Clinical Medicine, Xuzhou Medical University, Xuzhou, Jiangsu, 221004, China., Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province, China
- 4Department of Gastroenterology, The Affiliated Huaian Hospital of Xuzhou Medical University, Huaian, 223002, China, Huaian, China
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Pancreatic cancer is projected to become the second leading cause of cancer‑related death by 2030. Conventional interventions including surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy provide only modest survival benefits, underscoring an urgent need for more effective therapies. Although immunotherapy has revolutionized the management of several solid tumors, its clinical benefit in pancreatic cancer has so far been disappointing. Mounting evidence indicates that a highly immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME), dominated by tumor‑associated macrophages (TAMs), myeloid‑derived suppressor cells (MDSCs), and regulatory T cells (Tregs), drives immune evasion, tumor progression, metastasis, and chemoresistance through complex cytokine and chemokine networks. This review summarizes current knowledge of these immunosuppressive mechanisms and provides emerging strategies aimed at re‑educating or depleting these cellular constituents to enhance the efficacy of immunotherapy in pancreatic cancer.
Keywords: Pancreatic Cancer, Tumor Microenvironment, regulatory T cells, immune suppression, PD-1
Received: 24 Feb 2025; Accepted: 17 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Pan, Li, Qiao and Wang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Xiao Qiao, Department of Gastroenterology, The Affiliated Huaian Hospital of Xuzhou Medical University, Huaian, 223002, China, Huaian, China
Qiqi Wang, Department of Gastroenterology, Wenzhou Central Hospital, Wenzhou, China., Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.