Assumptions of the tumor 'escape' hypothesis.

The reasons why cancer cells are not destroyed by the immune system are likely to be similar, in most cases, to the reasons why normal cells are not destroyed by the immune system. Unfortunately for tumor immunologists, these reasons have not yet been fully elucidated. What is known, however, is that the lack of autoimmune destruction of normal tissue after immune activation is a finely regulated, highly orchestrated sequence of events. Viewed in this light, it is interesting to conceptualize the derangement of the tumor genome not merely as an engine that enables cancer cells to dodge immune recognition. The dysregulation characteristic of the transformed genome is also what makes tumor immunity, a specialized form of autoimmunity, possible.