Abstract 2271: Characteristics of peripheral blood T cell receptor repertoire and correlation with response to chemotherapy in patients with breast cancer
Authors: Liu Chun-Yu , Huang Chi-Cheng , Chen Ji-Lin , Tsai Yi-Fang , Chao Ta-Chung , Lien Pei-Ju , Lin Yen-Shu , Feng Chin-Jung , Chen Yen-Jen , Lai Jiun-I , Chiu Jen-Hwey , Hsu Chih-Yi , Tseng Ling-Ming 
Published: April 2023

Purpose: The success of immune checkpoint inhibitors therapy in triple negative breast cancer highlights the potential immunogenic characteristics of breast cancer. Increasing evidence have suggested that conventional chemotherapy can exert anti-cancer activity through various immune-based mechanisms. T cell receptor (TCR) diversity is crucial for immune responses and TCR repertoire has been reported acting as predictive and prognostic markers for cancer outcome. Here, we reported the TCR repertoire profiling in breast cancer and its association with chemotherapy and treatment response in breast cancer patients.

Experimental design: This study is part of VGH-TAYLOR study, a comprehensive precision medicine study protocol on the heterogeneity of Taiwanese breast cancer patients (NCT04626440). A total of 856 female patients with luminal A, luminal B1, luminal B2, HER2-enriched, or triple-negative breast cancers were recruited. The enrolled subjects contains patients who receive surgery as the first-line treatment followed by adjuvant therapy and who receive neoadjuvant therapy as the first-line treatment followed by surgery. The blood samples from patients during chemotherapy were collected for TCR sequencing. The Oncomine TCR Beta-LR Assay was applied to determine the dynamic change in TCR repertoire. We examined TCR repertoire in terms of clonality, TCR richness/evenness and convergence.

Results: Higher TCR clonality in breast cancer patients was associated with lower clonal richness. TCR clonality was positively correlated with age and stage but not tumor size. Patients with recurrence had higher TCR clonality and lower Shannon diversity. Patients with luminal B2 breast cancer showed lower TCR diversity compared to luminal A and triple-negative breast cancer. However, there were no significant differences in CDR3 length and the usage of variable and joining genes among breast cancer subtypes. Notably, both of adjuvant and neoadjuvant chemotherapies increased convergence and clonality while decreased Shannon diversity of TCR. In neoadjuvant settings, lower post-treatment blood TCR richness was associated with complete pathologic response.

Conclusion: These data suggested that TCR repertoire is associated with clinicopathological characteristics including stage and recurrence. TCR clonal richness might provide prognostic value for patients receiving neoadjuvant chemotherapy.

Citation Format: Chun-Yu Liu, Chi-Cheng Huang, Ji-Lin Chen, Yi-Fang Tsai, Ta-Chung Chao, Pei-Ju Lien, Yen-Shu Lin, Chin-Jung Feng, Yen-Jen Chen, Jiun-I Lai, Jen-Hwey Chiu, Chih-Yi Hsu, Ling-Ming Tseng. Characteristics of peripheral blood T cell receptor repertoire and correlation with response to chemotherapy in patients with breast cancer [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2023; Part 1 (Regular and Invited Abstracts); 2023 Apr 14-19; Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2023;83(7_Suppl):Abstract nr 2271.