Multimodal thermal therapy for solid tumor: a new interventional immunomodulatory therapy

Abstract Recurrence and metastasis are the main causes of death for cancer patients. Immunotherapies have become the hotspot in tumor treatment, but the limitations such as low response rates in most solid tumors and drug resistance still compromise the efficacy in clinical applications. For an effective treatment, elimination of the primary tumor burden and adequate release of specific antigens to stimulate endogenous antitumor immunity are both considered important factors. Interventional thermal therapy holds the potential of local tumor controlling while releasing a comprehensive range of tumor antigens to initiate the tumor immune cycle. However, the immune response activated by conventional interventional therapies is usually weak and lack of durability. This review aims to discuss the antitumor immune mechanisms potentially induced by different tumor thermal ablation techniques and their limitations, and thereby to introduce the advantage of multi-physical fields combined ablation therapy, a novel multimodal thermal therapy, for interventional immunomodulatory therapy. Graphical Abstract