Adaptive Cancer Therapy Modeling

The evolutionary and ecological dynamics of tumors under immune responses and therapeutic interventions pose major challenges to long-term treatment success. A major problem in cancer treatment is the emergence of resistance. Although treatment may initially achieve short-term disease control, resistant cancer cell subpopulations often arise leading to relapse with more aggressive and treatment-resistant forms of the disease. Here, we develop and analyze mathematical models describing the interactions among effector immune cells, effector-sensitive tumor cells, and effector-resistant tumor cells under distinct immune-evasion strategies. The models incorporate ecological and evolutionary processes, including competition and cooperation between resistant and sensitive tumor subpopulations. We identify threshold conditions governing tumor persistence, elimination, and phenotype dominance under varying therapeutic intensities. These findings provide a theoretical framework for designing targeted and combination therapies and offer insights into strategies for mitigating the treatment resistance.