IL18 at the Crossroads between Chronic Inflammation and T-cell Exhaustion in Pancreatic Cancer

Chronic inflammation and immune evasion are hallmarks of cancer. Cancer promotes T-cell differentiation toward an exhausted, or dysfunctional state,which contributes toimmune evasion. In this issue, Lutz and colleagues showthat the proinflammatory cytokine IL18 correlates with poor patient prognosis and promotes CD8 T-cell exhaustion in pancreatic cancer by enhancing IL2R signaling. This link between proinflammatory cytokines and T-cell exhaustion elucidates consequences of modulating cytokine signaling during cancer immunotherapy.