Biomaterial based breast cancer vaccine

描述（由申请人提供）：我们研究的广泛前提是生物材料科学在免疫学中的应用可能会极大地影响未来免疫系统疾病的治疗方式。目前，许多实验性癌症疫苗在体外分离和编程免疫细胞，并将编程细胞引入患者体内（例如，过继性T细胞转移，基于树突状细胞的疫苗接种），以引发抗肿瘤反应。这一应用为乳腺癌疫苗提出了一种新方法，即可以以微创方式引入体内的生物材料，用于原位编程宿主树突状细胞，以产生有效的免疫反应。在这个项目中要解决的具体假设是，一种模拟细菌感染的可注射生物材料系统，在呈递肿瘤抗原的同时，可以有效地招募、成熟和分散宿主树突状细胞，这些树突状细胞能够刺激特定的t细胞群，并引发强抗

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The broad premise underlying our research is that the application of biomaterials science to immunology may dramatically impact how diseases of the immune system are treated in the future. Currently, many experimental cancer vaccines isolate and program immune cells outside the body, and introduce the programmed cells back into the patient (e.g., adoptive T cell transfer, dendritic cell-based vaccinations) to elicit anti-tumor responses. This application proposes a new approach to breast cancer vaccines, in which biomaterials that can be introduced into the body in a minimally invasive manner are used to program, in situ, host dendritic cells to generate a potent immune response. The specific hypothesis to be addressed in this project is that an injectable biomaterial system that mimics bacterial infection, while presenting tumor antigens, can effectively recruit, mature and disperse host dendritic cells capable of stimulating specific T-cell populations and eliciting a strong anti tumor response in the context of breast cancer. This hypothesis will be tested with the following aims: (1) Cryogelation will be utilized to fabricate macroporous gel materials that can be introduced into the body in a minimally invasive manner, while subsequently allowing significant host cell infiltration, (2) DC recruitment factors and Toll Like Receptor ligands will be encapsulated and released in a sustained manner from the gels, and their effects on the types and numbers of DC recruited to the vaccine site will be investigated, and (3) The ability of these cryogels to provide effective prophylactic and therapeutic breast cancer vaccines in rodent models will be tested. The goal of this work is to develop a functional cancer vaccine that can be used to treat women suffering from breast cancer. A successful cancer vaccine would not only be capable of causing regression of a primary tumor, but could also target metastasis in sites distant to the original tumor site. Further, the memory component of the adaptive immune system may provide protection against recurrence in the future. Success in this effort would have a dramatic impact on women suffering from breast cancer, and could potentially have significant impact in the development of vaccines for other types of cancer.