Simmunogenetics of Cancer Publisher



Hirbodmobarakeh A¹ ; Amirzargar AA² ; Nikbin B² ; Nicknam MH² ; Kutikhin A³ ; Rezaei N^{4, 5}
Source: Cancer Immunology: A Translational Medicine Context Published:2015

Abstract

The immune system, a system with an undeniable but complex role in malignancies significantly can influence the face of malignancy with respect to predisposition, nature, prognosis, and response to treatment in each individual. The immune system of each individual is subject to variability due to different environmental factors and most importantly due to an uncountable number of polymorphisms in genes governing the immune system elements and cells. Immunogenetics, as the meeting point of two exciting fields of immunology and genetics, is a new but rapidly expanding field of science studying this immune polymorphism in order to understand the governance of genetics on the immune system. In this chapter, we will review the importance of immunogenetics in human cancers, its ups and downs through the history, its tools, their major limitations and definition of immune polymorphisms. Finally, we will end this chapter by reviewing the impact of genetic polymorphisms of the two most important groups of immune-related genes (i.e. human leukocyte antigen and cytokines) which were under the focus of researchers in the fields of immunogenetics and cancers. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2015.