Multimodal molecular landscape of response to Y90-resin microsphere radioembolization followed by nivolumab for advanced hepatocellular carcinoma

Combination therapy with radioembolization (yttrium-90)-resin microspheres) followed by nivolumab has shown a promising response rate of 30.6% in a Phase II trial (CA209-678) for advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC); however, the response mechanisms and relevant biomarkers remain unknown. By collecting both pretreatment and on-treatment samples, we performed multimodal profiling of tissue and blood samples and investigated molecular changes associated with favorable responses in 33 patients from the trial. We found that higher tumor mutation burden, mutations and higher expression of interferon gamma pathways occurred more frequently in responders. Meanwhile, non-responders tended to be enriched for a novel Asian-specific transcriptomic subtype (Kaya_P2) with a high frequency of chromosome 16 deletions and upregulated cell cycle pathways. Strikingly, unlike other cancer types, we did not observe any association between T-cell populations and treatment response, but tumors from responders had a higher proportion of CXCL9 /CXCR3 macrophages. Moreover, biomarkers discovered in previous immunotherapy trials were not predictive in the current cohort, suggesting a distinctive molecular landscape associated with differential responses to the combination therapy. This study unraveled extensive molecular changes underlying distinctive responses to the novel treatment and pinpointed new directions for harnessing combination therapy in patients with advanced HCC.