Emerging peptide therapeutics for the treatment of ovarian cancer

ABSTRACT

Introduction

The discovery of therapeutic proteomic targets has resulted in remarkable advances in oncology. Identification of functional and hallmark peptides in ovarian cancer can be leveraged for diagnostic and therapeutic targeting. These targets are expressed in different tumor cell locations, making them excellent candidates for theranostic imaging, precision therapeutics, and immunotherapy. The ideal target is homogeneously overexpressed in malignant cells with no expression in healthy cells, thereby avoiding off-tumor bystander toxicity. Several peptides are currently undergoing extensive evaluation for the development of vaccines, antibody-drug conjugates, monoclonal antibodies, radioimmunoconjugates, and cell therapy.

Areas covered

This review focuses on the significance of peptides as promising targets in ovarian cancer. English peer-reviewed articles and abstracts were searched in MEDLINE, PubMed, Embase, and major conference databases.

Expert opinion

Peptides and proteins expressed in tumor cells are an exciting area of research with great potential and may significantly influence precision therapeutics and immunotherapeutic strategies. Accurate utilization of peptide expression as a predictive biomarker has the potential to greatly enhance treatment precision. The ability to measure receptor expression paves the way for its use as a predictive biomarker for therapeutic targeting and requires critical validation of sensitivity and specificity for each indication to guide therapy.

KEYWORDS:

• Epithelial ovarian cancer
• drug development
• proteomics
• immunotherapy
• targeted therapy

Declaration of interest

A M Oza is a PI and participates in steering committees of trials sponsored by AstraZeneca, GSK, Clovis (uncompensated) and is the CEO of Ozmosis Research (uncompensated). He is also an advisor for Morphosys.

The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

The authors were supported by the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network, and Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation.