Oral Presentation 18th International Congress on Photobiology 2024

Targeting and blocking the PD-L1 immune checkpoint in pancreatic cancer using self-penetrating, light-responsive liposomes. (#84)

Girgis Obaid 1
  1. University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TEXAS, United States

Immunotherapy in pancreatic cancer suffers tremendously from an immunosuppressive microenvironment that is concurrent and, in part, due to extensive desmoplasia. In this work, we present light-responsive liposomes targeted towards the PD-L1 immune checkpoint in pancreatic cancer. Upon light activation, these liposomes induce immunogenic cell death and significantly disrupt tumor collagen to enable self-delivery thought pancreatic tumors developed from genetically engineered mouse model cell isolates. We will discuss the implications of self-delivery of these PD-L1 targeting and blocking liposomes and how the extent of self-delivery through tumors directly correlates with responses to immune checkpoint therapy and overall survival in pancreatic cancer.