Pivotal role of PD-1/PD-L1 immune checkpoints in immune escape and cancer progression: Their interplay with platelets and FOXP3+Tregs related molecules, clinical implications and combinational potential with phytochemicals.

Immune checkpoint proteins including programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1), its ligand PD-L1 and cytotoxic T lymphocyte-associated antigen-4 (CTLA-4) are involved in proliferation, angiogenesis, metastasis, chemoresistance via immune escape and immune tolerance by disturbing cytotoxic T cell activation. Though many clinical trials have been completed in several cancers by using immune checkpoint inhibitors alone or in combination with other agents to date, recently multi-target therapy is considered more attractive than monotherapy, since immune checkpoint proteins work with other components such as surrounding blood vessels, dendritic cells, fibroblasts, macrophages, platelets and extracellular matrix within tumor microenvironment. Thus, in the current review, we look back on research history of immune checkpoint proteins and discuss their associations with platelets or tumor cell induced platelet aggregation (TCIPA) and FOXP3+ regulatory T cells (Tregs) related molecules involved in immune evasion and tumor progression, clinical implications of completed trial results and signaling networks by phytochemicals for combination therapy with immune checkpoint inhibitors and suggest future research perspectives.