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Related Experiment Video

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Comparative Lesions Analysis Through a Targeted Sequencing Approach

Comparative Lesions Analysis Through a Targeted Sequencing Approach

Published on: November 5, 2019

Tumour mutational burden: an overview for pathologists.

Kenneth D Doig¹, Andrew Fellowes², Prudence Scott³

¹Department of Pathology, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Parkville, Vic, Australia; Sir Peter MacCallum Department of Oncology, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Vic, Australia.

|February 14, 2022

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Tumor mutational burden (TMB) is a key biomarker for predicting cancer immunotherapy response. Understanding TMB helps identify patients likely to benefit from immune checkpoint inhibitors.

Keywords:

Tumour mutational burden biomarker cancer genomics clinical sequencing immune checkpoint blockade molecular diagnostics neoantigen prediction precision oncology

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Area of Science:

Oncology
Immunology
Genomics

Background:

Cancer immunotherapy offers durable responses but lacks uniform efficacy across patients and tumor types.
A critical need exists for biomarkers to predict patient response to immunotherapies.
Tumor mutational burden (TMB) is emerging as a predictive biomarker for immunotherapy.

Purpose of the Study:

To provide an overview of the Tumor Mutational Burden (TMB) biomarker.
To explain TMB determination, its molecular basis, and relation to neoantigens.
To discuss the clinical utility and challenges of using TMB in cancer treatment.

Main Methods:

Review of scientific literature on TMB and cancer immunotherapy.
Definition and explanation of TMB as a diagnostic biomarker.
Discussion of TMB's role in stratifying patients for immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy.

Main Results:

TMB is defined as the average number of somatic mutations per megabase in a tumor exome.
TMB can stratify cancer patients for response to immune checkpoint inhibitors.
The relationship between TMB, neoantigens, and clinical response is complex.

Conclusions:

TMB is a valuable predictive biomarker for cancer immunotherapy.
Further understanding and standardization are needed for optimal clinical application of TMB.
Practicing pathologists should be informed about TMB's role in personalized cancer medicine.