Fig. 2: Experimental validation of reduced DCs in ICC samples with LNM and prognostic significance.

Kaplan–Meier survival curves for OS (A) and RFS (B) of 219 ICC patients grouped by LNM status in TMA cohort. C Representative immunofluorescence images of CD45+ CD11c+ DCs (400X, scale bar, 50 μm) and corresponding statistics in surgically resected ICC samples from TMA cohort. White arrows indicate tumor-infiltrating DCs. D Representative immunohistochemistry images of positive and negative CD8 staining (400X, scale bar, 50 μm), as well as cell counts of CD8+ TILs per field in ICC. E Spearman correlation analysis for CD45+ CD11c+ DCs and CD8+ TIL counts in TMA cohort. Kaplan–Meier survival curves for OS (F) and RFS (G) of 25 ICC patients divided by proportions of intra-tumoral dendritic cells in scPLC cohort. H Overall survival analysis of 244 ICC patients grouped by fractions of tumor-resting dendritic cells in FU-iCCA cohort. Kaplan–Meier survival curves for OS (I) and RFS (J) of 219 ICC patients grouped by cell counts of CD45+ CD11c+ DCs or CD8+ T cells (K) in TMA cohort. DCs dendritic cells, TIL tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes, TMA tissue microarray. ****p < 0.0001.