Antibody–Drug Conjugate Revolution in Breast Cancer: The Road Ahead

Thomas Grinda (1) , Elie Rassy (1, 2, 3) , Barbara Pistilli (4, 5, 6)

1 IGR - Institut Gustave Roussy
2 CESP - Centre de recherche en épidémiologie et santé des populations
3 U1018 (Équipe 2) - Oncostat
4 DIOPP - Département interdisciplinaire d’organisation des parcours patients
5 PMNCO - Prédicteurs moléculaires et nouvelles cibles en oncologie
6 Département de médecine oncologique [Gustave Roussy]

Opinion statement Antibody drug-conjugates (ADCs) have revolutionized the treatment of many types of cancer, including breast cancer. Recently, two new ADCs have been approved, trastuzumab deruxtecan and sacituzumab govitecan; both have demonstrated impressive improvements in overall survival, trastuzumab deruxtecan in all three subtypes of metastatic breast cancer and sacituzumab govitecan in luminal and triple negative metastatic breast cancer. These drugs are the results of significant progress and innovation in the construction of the three components of an ADC, the monoclonal antibody, the payload, and the linker, and of the discovery of new target antigens. ADC engineering has profoundly changed the paradigm of cancer treatment, on one side being effective on tumors considered inherently resistant to the payload class of drugs and on the other side demonstrating activity in tumors with very low target expression. Yet, it is likely that we are just at the beginning of a new era as the identification of new targets and the introduction of new ADC constructs and combinations will expand the field of ADC rapidly over the coming years.

Mots clés: Antibody–drug conjugate; Breast cancer.

Domaines: Cancer; Méthodes et statistiques; Statistiques [stat]; Autres [stat.ML]; Méthodologie [stat.ME]

Thomas Grinda, Elie Rassy, Barbara Pistilli. Antibody–Drug Conjugate Revolution in Breast Cancer: The Road Ahead. Current Treatment Options in Oncology, 2023, 24 (5), pp.442 - 465. ⟨10.1007/s11864-023-01072-5⟩. ⟨inserm-04563828⟩