Letter From the Editor- December

Dear JITC Readers,

Welcome to the final JITC digest of 2020. You are likely reading this email within a few days of the winter solstice—the shortest day of the year. Although 2020 has been a highly challenging year with some dark and difficult times, it is reassuring to know that each passing day will come with a little more light. 

 

Although the term has by now become cliché, we are indeed living in unprecedented times. Yet looking back upon 2020, some bright spots emerge from the dark and challenging circumstances in which we have been living. The society’s various task forces and working groups published several impactful papers, one of which, by Brian Gastman and colleagues on the SITC Surgery Committee, appears in this month’s issue. SITC also successfully carried out its first ever all-virtual annual meeting, and it was an amazing opportunity to reconnect with colleagues from all over and experience the very best in immunotherapy research (even if our interactions were through videochat windows). 

 

Additionally, JITC increased its impact factor to 10.252 in 2020, making it the highest ranked fully open access immunology journal and in the top 7 percent of all journals published in the oncology and immunology categories. I’m so grateful to you, our JITC readers, for your constant support of the journal, as well as the tireless efforts of all of our editors and peer reviewers. Thank you all so much for helping to make JITC the field-leading journal that it is today.

 

The articles in this month’s JITC digest are exemplary of why the journal continues on an upwards trajectory of success. Not only are the highlighted studies well-designed and tightly controlled, but the results forecast important trends for the future of the immunotherapy field. 

 

Two unique angles on therapeutic vaccination are provided by Juliane Schuhmacher et al and Iuliia Efimova et al, demonstrating that synthetic long peptides and cells dying an iron-dependent death, respectively, may offer advantages for the development of anti-tumor immunity. 

 

Combination regimens including multi-tyrosine kinase inhibitors and checkpoint blockade are the subject of reports by Javier Martin-Broto et al and Kohei Shigeta et al, further establishing the importance of angiogenesis in immune exclusion and demonstrating that combination strategies could expand the number of tumor types susceptible to PD-(L)1-targeting therapies. 

 

Finally, Diana Canals Hernaez and colleagues provide proof of concept that antibodies specific to tumor-restricted glycans can be developed and that they can specifically kill cancer cells when conjugated to toxic payloads.
 
I hope you enjoy this month’s JITC digest, and I wish a sincere and heartfelt happy holidays and best wishes for the New Year!

 

Best,

Pedro J. Romero, MD
Editor-in-Chief, Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer

To view the entire September 2020 JITC Digest, please click here. 

President's Message - July 2019

Dear Colleagues,

Summer is already here, and our attention is increasingly focused on the 34^th Annual Meeting & Pre-Conference Programs (SITC 2019), scheduled for Nov. 6-10, 2019. Organizers and staff have already put more than a year’s worth of planning and work into this meeting, and the pace of preparations will increase substantially over the next few months.

This year our meeting will return to the Gaylord National Hotel & Convention Center in National Harbor, Md. The venue has hosted many successful SITC programs and this fall will be no different. The Annual Meeting & Pre-Conference Programs connects all of us in the cancer immunotherapy field, including established and leading academic and government investigators in basic, translational and clinical research, early career investigators, patient care providers, industry professionals, regulatory colleagues and patient advocates.

This summer, SITC is launching its all new Career Connections initiative to make it even easier to connect with each other in ways that could foster new, long-lasting professional relationships. This program will connect job seekers and talent seekers in the cancer immunotherapy field with an enhanced year-round online platform and new opportunities for in-person connections at SITC 2019. Stay tuned for more details about the Career Connections initiative in the next few weeks and months.

We’ve observed a surge in quantity and quality of abstract submissions to the SITC Annual Meeting in recent years as our field has grown and matured. One of our goals for the Annual Meeting over the last several years has been to increase opportunities for oral abstract presentations, in order to better recognize and share the work and to give more opportunities for oral abstract presentations to early career investigators. This year we are nearly doubling the number of oral abstract presentations over the previous year. For those considering submitting an abstract to SITC 2019, don’t forget the deadline to submit a regular abstract or late-breaking abstract application is Aug. 1, 2019, at 5 p.m. PDT.

We continue to develop collaborations with other professional societies and organizations. We owe this spirit of collaboration to several of our past presidents. The newest collaboration at our upcoming Annual Meeting, this time with the American Society of Hematology, is scheduled for Thursday, Nov. 7, 2019, from 1-5 p.m. EDT, and will be co-chaired by Katy Rezvani, MD, PhD (The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center), and John M. Timmerman, MD (University of California, Los Angeles). This program will feature exciting presentations on the current state of research in hematologic malignancies.

We are continually adding new program, session and speaker information to the SITC 2019 itinerary. For the latest information regarding the SITC 2019 schedule and session information, please visit the SITC 2019 website today. Hotel rooms in National Harbor are limited and rapidly being reserved, so please don’t hesitate to confirm your registration today and secure your lodging in National Harbor.

Great scientific organizations are often associated with high quality journals publishing impactful, state of-the-art research. We are very proud to report that the Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer (JITC) increased its impact factor this year to 8.676. The impact factor places JITC in the top 3 percent of all fully open access oncology journals and ranks it in the top 8 percent of all journals published in the oncology and immunology categories. Congratulations to JITC Editor-in-Chief Pedro Romero, MD, the JITC Editorial Board, its vast collection of reviewers and SITC staff for hitting it out of the park again. Please consider submitting your best research to JITC or becoming a reviewer for the journal as we continue to grow its reputation and impact in oncology.

Finally, the 2019 SITC Election is fast approaching. Scheduled for July 10-24, 2019, SITC regular members and emeritus members will consider six candidates to fill three future openings for three-year terms as At-Large Directors on the SITC Board of Directors. Thank you to this year’s candidates who have offered their time and expertise to serve our Society.

Please visit the SITC website today to learn more about each of this year’s six candidates (or continue scrolling to view their names), including their biographies and positions statements. If you are not currently a SITC member, I hope you’ll consider joining SITC today.

Sincerely,

Mario Sznol, MD
SITC President

JITC Earns Impact Factor of 8.374

It was with great joy that I was able to share last month news of the Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer (JITC), the open access journal of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer published by Biomed Central – Springer Nature, having received its first impact factor of 8.374.

The impact factor is a critically important calculation involving the number of citations published articles received during a two-year timeline. Thus, this figure readily communicates to prospective authors the relative reach and quality of research a publication possesses.

Even before the publication of its impact factor, awareness of JITC had reached new heights in 2018, as submissions had already increased by 65 percent over last year. We know our 8.374 impact factor is merely a starting point from which JITC will grow in sync with the steady expansion of research and translation in the field of immuno-oncology. The number of submissions will multiply; the quality and breadth of research will increase; JITC will become an even stronger open access, peer-reviewed online journal.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all of JITC’s Section Editors, Associate Editors and reviewers who generously give so much of their time to ensure the journal publishes only the highest quality research in the field of cancer immunotherapy and tumor immunology.

Lastly, please take a moment to remember and celebrate the life and work of Harald von Boehmer who sadly passed away late last month. His contributions to the understanding of the T cell receptor’s key role in T cell development, differentiation, and central tolerance induction are part of the foundations of our current understanding of tumor immunology.

With best regards,

Pedro J. Romero, MD

Editor-in-Chief, Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer