Current status of immunotherapy in acute myeloid leukemia

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a rapidly progressive, poor prognosis malignant tumor caused by hematopoietic stem cells/progenitor cells. In recent years, there have been significant advances in basic and preclinical research on AML. Compared with traditional chemotherapy, hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) significantly improved prognosis. However, with high recurrence rates and low 5-year survival rates, more and more attention has been focused on immunotherapy strategies for AML. Given the immunological characteristics of AML and the mechanisms of immune escape, ongoing efforts are aimed at improving the strategy of immunotherapy and the design of novel therapies, such as vaccines, monoclonal antibodies, chimeric receptor-engineered T cells (CAR-T), and checkpoint inhibitors, which hopefully can deliver higher specificity and efficacy in AML therapy. In this review, we provide an overview of the immunological characteristics of conventional AML therapies, explore immune avoidance mechanisms, and describe the mechanisms of active and passive immunotherapies and current clinical trials