Figure 2.

TAMs can promote melanoma growth and progression by creating an immunosuppressive immune environment by recruiting and maintaining immunosuppressive cells, such as Tregs, M2-like TAMs and MDSCs and reducing effector cells activation; promoting angiogenesis directly by secreting VEGF and MIF and indirectly through TNF-α and IL-1 α promoting angiogenesis by melanoma cells; enabling invasion by secreting metalloproteinases; and enabling metastasis by promoting the secretion of factors which increase phenotype switching (TGF-β), increase motility (IL-8), and increase invasion (IL-6). Created with BioRender.com.