Spatial insights from clinical biopsies: Why lymphocyte relationships matter

Advances in tissue-based technology in the past few years have created unprecedented opportunities to identify biomarkers of disease processes, especially by using multi-omics technologies and datasets to derive valid and useful signatures of disease. Importantly the use of tissue phenotyping and multiplex immunofluorescence (mIF) assays offer the unique advantage of preserving the architectural features of the tumor and revealing the spatial relationships between tumor cells and immune cells that allow a detailed characterization of specific cell phenotypes defined by co- or lack of expression of multiple markers that may help in predicting clinical responses and mechanisms of resistance to therapy.