# Single-cell dissection of hepatocellular carcinoma immunity: from heterogeneous subtypes to precision therapeutics

## TL;DR

This paper reviews how single-cell sequencing helps understand the immune environment in liver cancer, aiming to improve precision treatments.

## Contribution

The paper provides a comprehensive synthesis of immune cell classifications in HCC using single-cell data and their therapeutic implications.

## Key findings

- Single-cell sequencing reveals detailed immune cell heterogeneity in hepatocellular carcinoma.
- Immune subsets in HCC are classified based on their functional states and biomarker gene profiles.
- Understanding immune cell dynamics in the tumor microenvironment can guide precision therapeutic strategies.

## Abstract

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) represents one of the most prevalent malignancies worldwide and poses a critical public health challenge due to difficulties in early diagnosis, therapy resistance, and high mortality rates. The complex tumor microenvironment (TME) of HCC plays a pivotal role in tumor progression, immune evasion, metastasis, and treatment resistance. Single-cell sequencing (scRNA-seq) has emerged as a revolutionary tool for resolving the intricacies and cellular heterogeneity of the TME, with its applications in advancing therapeutic research attracting considerable attention. As the primary battleground for antitumor immune responses, the HCC tumor TME warrants comprehensive analysis of immune cell subsets at distinct developmental and functional states to elucidate the complexity of tumor immunology. This review synthesizes extensive research on TME immune cellular subpopulations, in order to summarize mainstream classifications of immune subsets at single-cell resolution and analyze their functional significance and therapeutic value through biomarker gene profiling.