Fig. 7

Conditional knockout of ELF4 in macrophages enhances immunotherapy efficacy in a xenograft model with overexpressed circZNF451. A Infiltration of CD8⁺ T cells and CD163⁺ macrophages in the tumor tissues of the four groups (WT; WT + anti-PD1; ELF4 KO and ELF4 KO + PD1) was verified by IHC (n = 5 for each group). B Infiltration of CD8⁺ T cells in the TME; the percentage of PD1⁺/IFN-γ⁺CD8⁺ T cells of the four groups were detected by flow cytometry. C Infiltration of CD163⁺ macrophages in the TME of the four groups was analyzed by flow cytometry. D Change in tumor size in the ten LUAD patients (six PD and four PR) receiving PD1 blockade monotherapy. E Enrichment of circZNF451 in the exosomes in four PR and six PD patients receiving PD1 blockade monotherapy was verified by qRT-PCR. F Correlation between the enrichment of circZNF451 in exosomes and the expression of circZNF451 in tumor tissues of the 10 LUAD patients receiving PD1 blockade monotherapy. A Spearman correlation analysis was applied. G Correlation between the enrichment of circZNF451 in exosomes and tumor shrinkage was analyzed by Spearman correlation analysis. H Infiltration of CD8⁺ T cells and ELF4⁺CD163⁺ macrophages in the tumor tissues of 10 patients receiving PD1 blockade monotherapy; scale bar, scale bar, 100 μm. A-C were analyzed by one-way ANOVA test after adjusting for multiple comparisons. H used the two-tailed, unpaired Student’s t test. All experiments with statistical analysis have been repeated for at least three times