Immunotherapy: Improving anti-cancer
vaccine responses in humans (N&V)
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Nature
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Cancer
Embargo
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London: Wednesday 11 March 2015 18:00 (GMT)
New York: Wednesday 11 March 2015 14:00 (EDT)
Tokyo: Thursday 12 March 2015 03:00 (JST)
Sydney: Thursday 12 March 2015 05:00 (AEDT)
Improved survival in patients with aggressive brain tumours who are treated with certain anticancer vaccines may be achieved by pre-conditioning the vaccination site. Inducing
inflammation at this site helps the vaccine travel to the appropriate part of the body, where it
can activate an immune response against tumours, a small clinical trial in Nature this week
indicates. Although the trial was performed in only 12 patients, the findings may pave the
way for new ways of improving the efficacy of anti-cancer vaccines.
Dendritic cells — special cells that travel to the lymph nodes where they can initiate an
immune response against infectious agents or tumours — have been used to develop anticancer vaccines. However, dendritic cell vaccines have shown limited promise in the
treatment of advanced cancers.
Exposing the vaccination site to toxins that induce inflammation can improve the honing of
dendritic cells to the lymph nodes and enhances anti-tumour responses, John Sampson and
colleagues demonstrate. In a clinical trial in 12 patients with glioblastoma multiforme, an
aggressive form of brain cancer, three patients that received pre-conditioning treatment were
still alive at the end of the study (representing a minimal survival at least two times longer
than those receiving the vaccine alone). The findings, corroborated in mice, provide insights
into the factors that underlie the success of dendritic cell vaccines and suggest an approach to
improve sub-optimal vaccines.
Article and author details
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Tetanus toxoid and CCL3 improve dendritic cell vaccines in mice and
glioblastoma patients
Corresponding Author
John Sampson (Duke University, Durham, NC, USA)
Email: john.sampson@duke.edu, Tel: +1 919 684 9041
News & Views Author
Nina Bhardwaj (Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, USA)
Email: nina.bhardwaj@mssm.edu
DOI
10.1038/nature14320
Online paper*
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature14320
* Please link to the article in online versions of your report (the URL will go live after the embargo
ends).