DKK1 Promotes Tumor Immune Evasion and Impedes Anti-PD-1 Treatment by Inducing Immunosuppressive Macrophages in Gastric Cancer

Abstract

Tumor-associated macrophages (TAM) have key functions in promoting a suppressive tumor immune microenvironment (TIME) and immune evasion, which largely limit treatment effects of immune-checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) in different cancers, including gastric cancer. Dickkopf-1 (DKK1) is associated with tumor progression and has been shown to negatively regulate antitumor immunity, but the impact of DKK1 on the TIME remains incompletely understood. Here, we found that tumoral DKK1 expression is closely associated with worse survival and a suppressive TIME in gastric cancer patients. Results from in vitro coculture assays suggested that DKK1 induces macrophages to become immunosuppressive, thereby inhibiting antitumor responses of CD8 T cells and natural killer (NK) cells. In vivo DKK1 blockade in syngeneic gastric cancer mouse models reprogramed TAMs to restore the immune activity in the TIME and triggered significant tumor regression. DKK1 blockade also directly reduced the growth of human gastric cancer tumors with high DKK1 expression in a xenograft model. Mechanistically, DKK1 interacted with cytoskeleton-associated protein 4 (CKAP4) on the macrophage surface and activated downstream PI3K-AKT signaling, which contributed to immune suppression. TAM reprogramming by DKK1 blockade also augmented the efficacy of programmed cell death protein-1 (PD-1) blockade in gastric cancer models. Therefore, our study provides novel insights into the role of DKK1 on tumor-intrinsic, innate, and adaptive antitumor immunity modulation and suggests that DKK1 is a promising immunotherapeutic target for enhanced PD-1 blockade therapy in gastric cancer.