Prospect for immune checkpoint blockade: dynamic and comprehensive monitorings pave the way

Immune checkpoint blockade, which releases the brake of the immune system to enhance anticancer immune response, stands out in the cancer immunotherapy field due to their remarkable and long-lasting effect. However, the overall response rate for currently approved immune checkpoint inhibitors is only about 10–40%. We have summarized three major components, which are the presence of checkpoints, the immune-activation mechanism and the immune-inhibitory mechanism, containing six factors to describe the cancer–immune interaction dynamically and comprehensively, which shed light on promising biomarkers in immune checkpoint therapy.