Cancer vaccines and immunotherapies: emerging perspectives

Research efforts over the last two decades studying immuneresponses to human carcinomas have demonstrated that antigens expressed by tumor cells can elicit specific cellular and humoral immuneresponses. Unfortunately, despite the observation that existent immuneresponses to these antigens are present in some patients with cancer, the tumors continue to progress. Thus, there has been considerable interest to augment these immuneresponses by immunization. Some of the clinical trials of the first cancer vaccineshave provided evidence of clinical benefit thus encouraging the development of other vaccines. Challenges to development of such cancer vaccinesinclude the identification and characterization of the antigen(s) to be targeted, the definition of the desired immuneresponse to be elicited by the vaccine, and the choice of the appropriate vaccine delivery system.