Synergistic upregulation of PD‑L1 in tumor cells and CD39 in tumor‑infiltrating CD8<sup>+</sup> T cells leads to poor prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma

Kang,Xi; Zhao,Sinan; Lin,Shan; Li,Jing; Wang,Shunxiang

doi:10.3892/ol.2024.14501

Synergistic upregulation of PD‑L1 in tumor cells and CD39 in tumor‑infiltrating CD8⁺ T cells leads to poor prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma

Authors:
- Xi Kang
- Sinan Zhao
- Shan Lin
- Jing Li
- Shunxiang Wang
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Affiliations: Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery, The Fourth Hospital of Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, Hebei 050000, P.R. China, Department of Endocrinology, The Second Hospital of Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, Heibei 050000, P.R. China
Published online on: June 12, 2024 https://doi.org/10.3892/ol.2024.14501
Article Number: 368
Copyright: © Kang et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution License.

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Abstract

The immune escape of tumor cells and functional status of tumor‑infiltrating T cells may serve pivotal roles in the tumor immune microenvironment and progression of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The present study enrolled 91 patients with HCC and examined programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD‑L1) expression in tumor cells and CD39 expression in tumor‑infiltrating CD8+ T cells in patient samples using multiplex immunofluorescence assays. The impact of PD‑L1 and CD39 expression levels on the prognosis of patients with HCC was investigated utilizing Kaplan‑Meier analyses. The individual upregulation of PD‑L1 in tumor cells, as well as the individual upregulation of CD39 expression in tumor‑infiltrating CD8⁺ T cells did not significantly affect the prognosis of patients with HCC. However, the simultaneous upregulation of both PD‑L1 in tumor cells and CD39 in tumor‑infiltrating CD8⁺ T cells was associated with reduced overall survival in patients with HCC. Therefore, the results of the present study suggested that the interplay between tumor cell immune escape and tumor‑infiltrating immune cell functional status within the tumor immune microenvironment may have had a substantial impact on the prognosis of patients with HCC. Mechanistically, increased expression levels of PD‑L1 in tumor cells may improve the immune escape capacity of tumors, whilst upregulation of CD39 in tumor‑infiltrating T cells may be associated with T cell exhaustion. Therefore, the upregulation of PD‑L1 expression in tumor cells, in conjunction with the exhaustion of tumor‑infiltrating CD8⁺ T cells, could serve as a future potential prognostic indicator of patients with HCC.

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