Immune correlates of melanoma survival in adoptive cell therapy

The advent of immunotherapies for cancer has resulted in robust clinical responses and confirmed that the immune system can significantly inhibit tumor progression. The recent success of adoptive cell therapy against melanoma suggests that endogenous T-cell responses have the potential to control cancer. However, the lack of responses in some patients receiving such therapy indicates a need for a better understanding of the host immune response to solid tumors. In this review, we summarize the current knowledge on the characteristics of adoptively transferred T cells associated with successful anti-melanoma immune responses in humans.