Prostate Cancer and Immunoproteome: Awakening and Reprogramming the Guardian Angels

Prostate cancer is a life-threatening molecular disorder that is undruggable to date because of stumbling blocks in the standardization of therapy. An emerging framework of research is addressing how pathways that are derailed during tumorigenesis are linked to immunological responses, which are instrumental in immunosurveillance of cancer. However, interestingly, cancer cells circumvent such immunosurveillance through development of poorly immunogenic tumor cell variants (immunoselection) and through subversion of the immunological nanomachinery (immunosubversion). Detailed mechanistic insights of molecular specificities that regulate natural killer (NK) cell function suggest that it might be promising to design NK cell-based immunotherapeutic interventions against prostate cancer. Here, we elucidate evidence for NK cell targeting of prostate cancer proteome and address critical questions that, in our view, need thoughtfulness for the development of successful NK cell-based therapies. This review also disproves our contemporary understanding of the versatile regulators of DNA damage repair (ATM, ATR) that trigger cell surface expression of NKG2D ligands and consequent elimination of the tumor cells by NK cells and other lymphocytes that express NK cell receptors. Substantial fraction of information has been generated that guarantees productive future for this technology as more optimized constructs, better trial designs, and improved platforms are being brought from benchtop to bedside.