title: Personalized approaches to active immunotherapy in cancer.
abstract: Immunotherapy is emerging as a promising anti-cancer curative modality. However, in contrast to recent advances obtained employing checkpoint blockade agents and T cell therapies, clinical efficacy of therapeutic cancer vaccines is still limited. Most vaccination attempts in the clinic represent "off-the shelf" approaches since they target common "self" tumor antigens, shared among different patients. In contrast, personalized approaches of vaccination are tailor-made for each patient and in spite being laborious, hold great potential. Recent technical advancement enabled the first steps in the clinic of personalized vaccines that target patient-specific mutated neo-antigens. Such vaccines could induce enhanced tumor-specific immune response since neo-antigens are mutation-derived antigens that can be recognized by high affinity T cells, not limited by central tolerance. Alternatively, the use of personalized vaccines based on whole autologous tumor cells, overcome the need for the identification of specific tumor antigens. Whole autologous tumor cells could be administered alone, pulsed on dendritic cells as lysate, DNA, RNA or delivered to dendritic cells in-vivo through encapsulation in nanoparticle vehicles. Such vaccines may provide a source for the full repertoire of the patient-specific tumor antigens, including its private neo-antigens. Furthermore, combining next-generation personalized vaccination with other immunotherapy modalities might be the key for achieving significant therapeutic outcome.
authors.affiliation: Ludwig Center for Cancer Research at the University of Lausanne, Department of Oncology, University Hospital of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Eran
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ophir
authors.affiliation: Ludwig Center for Cancer Research at the University of Lausanne, Department of Oncology, University Hospital of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Sara
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bobisse
authors.affiliation: Ludwig Center for Cancer Research at the University of Lausanne, Department of Oncology, University Hospital of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland; Ovarian Cancer Research Center, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.
authors.forename: George
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Coukos
authors.affiliation: Ludwig Center for Cancer Research at the University of Lausanne, Department of Oncology, University Hospital of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland; Center of Experimental Therapeutics, Ludwig Center for Cancer Research, Department of Oncology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Alexandre
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Harari
authors.affiliation: Ludwig Center for Cancer Research at the University of Lausanne, Department of Oncology, University Hospital of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland; Center of Experimental Therapeutics, Ludwig Center for Cancer Research, Department of Oncology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland; Ovarian Cancer Research Center, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. Electronic address: Lana.Kandalaft@chuv.ch.
authors.forename: Lana E
authors.initials: LE
authors.lastname: Kandalaft
mesh_terms: D000951:Antigens, Neoplasm / Q000276:immunology; D001324:Autoantigens / Q000276:immunology; D019496:Cancer Vaccines / Q000276:immunology; D003713:Dendritic Cells / Q000276:immunology; D006801:Humans; D016233:Immunotherapy, Active; D053758:Nanoparticles; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000628:therapy*; D057285:Precision Medicine
chemical_list: D000951:Antigens, Neoplasm; D001324:Autoantigens; D019496:Cancer Vaccines
keywords: Cancer vaccines; Dendritic cells; Neo-antigens; Personalized vaccines; Tumor-associated antigens; Whole tumor vaccines