Understanding and manipulating chemokines and their receptors in the context of adjuvants

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All vaccines contain components called 'adjuvants' that boost the immune response and enhance vaccine-induced protection. Different adjuvants can also select the type of response that develops, with the appropriate type of response inducing disease protection, whereas inappropriate responses may cause increased susceptibility to infection. Despite this crucial role for adjuvants in vaccine development, the reasons why certain vaccine adjuvants and/or delivery systems are more or less effective at inducing immune responses or promoting the preferential induction of particular types of response are unknown. It appears that the number, type and persistence of the cells of the immune system that underlie vaccine responses (lymphocytes) may be an important determinant of how effective a vaccine is. Thus understanding the factors that control immune cell behaviour will clearly make a significant contribution to the rational design of vaccines. We propose that the molecules regulating the movement of the cells of the immune system, namely chemokines and their receptors, orchestrate these processes and furthermore, appropriate modulation of chemokines will enhance adjuvant and consequently vaccine efficacy. These studies are of a basic biological nature, however we believe they will open up new avenues in vaccine adjuvant research, and provide a rational framework for the application of chemokines and manipulation of cellular movement in vaccine development.