Abstract 7472: Melanoma-intrinsic expression of signal-regulatory protein alpha (SIRPα) confers tumor cells resistance to anti-tumor adaptive immunity
Authors: Weng Chien-Huan , Schochet Chana , Hamadene Linda , Eghbali Shabnam , Monette Sébastien , Mangarin Levi , Liu Cailian , Samaan Fadi , Wolchok Jedd D. , Merghoub Taha 
Published: March 2024

Introduction: Melanoma patient survival rates have significantly improved recently owing to the development of both targeted therapies and immunotherapies. However, there are still around 50% of patients relapse. The limited response to immunotherapies and global rise in melanoma incidence, with around 290,000 cases newly diagnosed each year, highlight the need for identifying new biomarkers, modulatory pathways, and risk factors for melanoma development. Earlier studies have characterized that aberrant expression of CD47 (a.k.a. “don’t eat me” signal) is one of the mechanisms that tumors exploit to avoid innate immune surveillance. CD47 blockade has been demonstrated to restore myeloid effector function by reinvigorating phagocytosis of tumor cells, which further enhances anti-tumor T cell responses. However, melanoma tumors are resistant to CD47 blockade. Interestingly, we and others have discovered that human and mouse melanoma cells express high levels of SIRPα, the receptor for CD47, which is typically expressed in myeloid compartments.

Experimental Procedure: To investigate the role of tumor SIRPα, we designed gRNAs to CRISPR out the SIRPα N-terminal region, where it interacts with CD47, in B16 melanoma and generated SIRPα+/+ (WT) and SIRPα-/- (KO) B16 tumors. We conducted multiple in vitro and in vivo experiments to investigate whether tumor SIRPα played a role in tumor growth and modulated anti-tumor immunity. The preclinical tumor model we used is B16-F10 melanoma and the murine strains we used are the immune-competent (C57BL/6j; B6) and the immune-deficient (RAGnull) mice. For phenotypic and functional assessments, we performed analysis using flow cytometry, immunohistochemistry (IHC) and single cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) derived from live-sorted CD45+ tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) of SIRPα-WT and SIRPα-KO B16 tumors.

Summary of Unpublished Data

Our preliminary data in a preclinical B16-F10 melanoma model revealed that surface SIRPα expression is necessary for optimal B16-F10 melanoma growth in immune-competent mice, but not in immune-deficient RAGnull mice, suggesting a potential crosstalk between tumor SIRPα and the host adaptive immune system. Intriguingly, we found that selective SIRPα deletion in melanoma cells results in a significant increase of immune infiltrates within melanoma tumors that further suppresses tumor growth.

Concluding Remarks: SIRPα is required for optimal melanoma development by suppressing anti-tumor adaptive immunity.

Ethics Approval: All mice were maintained in microisolator cages and treated in accordance with the NIH and American Association of Laboratory Animal Care regulations. All mouse procedures and experiments for this study were approved by the Weill Cornell Medicine Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee.

Citation Format: Chien-Huan Weng, Chana Schochet, Linda Hamadene, Shabnam Eghbali, Sébastien Monette, Levi Mangarin, Cailian Liu, Fadi Samaan, Jedd D. Wolchok, Taha Merghoub. Melanoma-intrinsic expression of signal-regulatory protein alpha (SIRPα) confers tumor cells resistance to anti-tumor adaptive immunity [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2024; Part 1 (Regular Abstracts); 2024 Apr 5-10; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2024;84(6_Suppl):Abstract nr 7472.