Cryoimmunology: Opportunities and challenges in biomedical science and practice

Abstract

Autologous and allogeneic cryoimmunological medicine is a brand new branch of biomedical science and clinical practice that examines the features and formation of the immune response to immunogenic properties of normal and malignant biological structures altered by ultralow temperature, as well as specific changes in the structural and functional characteristics of immune cells and tissues after cryopreservation. Cryogenic protein denaturation phenomenon provides important insights into the mechanisms underlying the damage to cryogenic lesions immediately after freeze–thawing sessions in bioscience and medicine applications. The newly formed cryocoagulated protein components (cryomodified protein components) are crucial in cryoimmunology from the perspective of the formation of immunological substances at ultralow temperatures. Dendritic cells and cryocell detritus (cryocell debris) formed in living biological tissue after exposure to ultralow temperature in vivo may be an indication of one of the essential mechanisms involved in the cryoimmunological response of living structures to the impact of ultralow temperature exposure. Hence, the formation of new autologous and allogeneic cryoinduced immunogenic substances is a novel concept in biomedical research globally. Accordingly, this review focuses on issues concerning the peculiarities of the interaction of the immune system with a dominant malignant neoplasm tissue after exposure to subzero temperatures, considering the original cryogenic technical approaches. We present an overview of the state-of-the-art methods of cryoimmunology, and their major developments, past and present. The need for the delineation of structural and functional characteristics of the biological substrates of the immune system after cryopreservation that can be used in adoptive cell therapy, especially in cancer patients, is emphasized.