Noncoding RNAs as novel immunotherapeutic tools against cancer

Immunotherapy is implemented as an important treatment strategy in various malignancies. In cancer, immunotherapy is employed for successful killing of tumor cells with high specificity and greater efficacy, with minimum side effects. Despite various available strategies, cellular immunotherapy including innate (NK cells, macrophages, dendritic cells) and adaptive (B cells and T cells) immune cells plays a critical role in tumor microenvironment. Since past few years, many drugs targeting immune checkpoint proteins including CTLA-4 and PD-1/PD-L1 have been investigated as immunotherapy approach against cancer but complete effectiveness still remains a question, as diverse mechanisms involved in tumorigenesis may result in the development of cancer cell resistance. Number of evidences have highlighted the significant role of non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) in regulating multiple stages of cancer initiation, progression & immunity. ncRNAs comprises 98% human transcriptome and are basically considered as dark genome. Among ncRNAs, miRNAs and lncRNAs have been extensively studied in regulating diverse processes of cancer tumorigenesis. Upregulation of oncogenic and downregulation of tumor suppressive miRNAs/lncRNAs has been reported to facilitate the cancer progression and invasiveness. This chapter summarizes how an interplay between ncRNAs and immune cells in cancer pathogenesis can be therapeutically targeted to improve current treatment regimen. Strategies should be employed to improve the efficacy and reduce off-target effects of ncRNA based immunotherapy. Henceforth, combination of ncRNAs and available immunotherapy can be argued to enhance the efficacy of existing immunotherapeutic approaches against cancer to improve patient's survival.