Combination anti-PD-1 and anti-CTLA-4 therapy generates waves of clonal responses that include progenitor-exhausted CD8 T cells [dataset 3]

Combination checkpoint blockade with anti-PD-1 and anti-CTLA-4 antibodies has shown promising efficacy in melanoma. However, the underlying mechanism in humans remains unclear. We performed RNA+TCR single-cell analysis across time in 36 stage IV melanoma patients treated with anti-PD-1, anti-CTLA-4, or combination therapy. We developed the algorithm Cyclone to track temporal clonal dynamics and underlying cell states. Checkpoint blockade induced waves of clonal T cell responses that peaked at distinct timepoints. Combination therapy resulted in greater magnitude of clonal responses at 6 and 9 weeks compared to single-agent therapies, including melanoma-specific CD8 T cells and exhausted CD8 T cell (TEX) clones. Focused analyses of TEX identified that anti-CTLA-4 induced robust expansion and proliferation of progenitor TEX, which synergized with anti-PD-1 to reinvigorate TEX during combination therapy. These next generation immune profiling approaches can guide the selection of drugs, schedule, and dosing for novel combination strategies. Overall design: We performed single-cell RNA+TCR sequencing on CD8 T cells sorted from PBMCs collected 3 weeks apart from two healthy donors.