Comprehensive analysis of immune evasion in breast cancer by single-cell RNA-seq

The tumor microenvironment is composed of numerous cell types, including tumor, immune and stromal cells. Cancer cells interact with the tumor microenvironment to suppress anticancer immunity. In this study, we molecularly dissected the tumor microenvironment of breast cancer by single-cell RNA-seq. We profiled the breast cancer tumor microenvironment by analyzing the single-cell transcriptomes of 52,163 cells from the tumor tissues of 15 breast cancer patients. The tumor cells and immune cells from individual patients were analyzed simultaneously at the single-cell level. This study explores the diversity of the cell types in the tumor microenvironment and provides information on the mechanisms of escape from clearance by immune cells in breast cancer.