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Melanoma Treatments: Advances and Mechanisms
Author(s) -
Marzuka Alexander,
Huang Laura,
Theodosakis Nicholas,
Bosenberg Marcus
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
journal of cellular physiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.529
H-Index - 174
eISSN - 1097-4652
pISSN - 0021-9541
DOI - 10.1002/jcp.25019
Subject(s) - melanoma , medicine , cancer research , mapk/erk pathway , monoclonal antibody , metastatic melanoma , immunotherapy , immune system , cancer , targeted therapy , immunology , bioinformatics , computational biology , signal transduction , biology , antibody , biochemistry
Advances in the understanding of the molecular pathogenesis of melanoma and in cancer immunology have led to the rational design and recent clinical implementation of a variety of novel therapies for metastatic melanoma. BRAF and MEK inhibitors that target the MAPK pathway have high rates of clinical response in BRAF‐mutant melanoma. Therapies that modulate the immune response to melanoma, including monoclonal antibodies that interfere with pathways that inhibit T‐cell function, have been shown to be effective in melanoma. Lessons learned from these encouraging results are driving the development of new treatments for melanoma and other cancers. This review will focus on the science and clinical findings related to targeted therapies that inhibit BRAF or MEK as well as the immunotherapies that block the CTLA‐4 or PD‐1 pathways. Other experimental and combinatorial therapeutic approaches will also be discussed. J. Cell. Physiol. 9999: 2626–2633, 2015. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.