Interestingly, these early receptors were rather universally distributed among CD8 T cell clusters in the tumor microenvironment of human nonsmall cell lung carcinoma, colon carcinoma, hepatocellular carcinoma, oropharyngeal carcinoma and breast cancer tumors, whereas the typical the late receptors NKG2A, TIM‐3 and CD39 were selectively expressed by a limited number of CD8 T cell clusters. This evidence concerns the gene CD8A and oropharyngeal carcinoma.