Pre-treatment with MAPK or Akt inhibitors followed by stimulation with recombinant MIF protein in PBMC-derived CD8 + T cells isolated from HER2 + IBC patients revealed that MIF induces NFAT1 nuclear translocation (from cytoplasm to nucleus) and upregulates LAG3 and TIGIT expression, a process partially mediated by p38 signaling (Fig. 5j, l, m; Extended Data Fig. S11e). Here, MIF is linked to inflammatory breast carcinoma.