Evoking durable anti-cancer responses with blocking antibodies to PD-1 and PD-L1

Inhibitory immune checkpoints play a critical role in regulating the strength and duration of immune responses in order to maintain self-tolerance and prevent autoimmunity (1). Such regulatory mechanisms are typically exploited by tumors as an immune escape mechanism and thereby pose a major obstacle to the induction of clinically relevant anti-cancer immune responses capable of controlling and/or eradicating disease (2).