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Abstract
Results of therapeutic vaccines for established chronic infections or cancers are still unsatisfactory. The only therapeutic cancer vaccine approved for clinical use is the sipuleucel-T, for the treatment of metastatic prostate cancer, which induces a limited 4-month improvement in the overall survival of vaccinated patients compared to controls. This represents a remarkable advancement in the cancer immunotherapy field, although the clinical outcome of cancer vaccines needs to be substantially improved. To this aim, a multipronged strategy is required, including the evaluation of mechanisms underlying the effective elicitation of immune responses by cancer vaccines. The recent development of new technologies and computational tools allows the comprehensive and quantitative analysis of the interactions between all of the components of innate and adaptive immunity over time. Here we review the potentiality of systems biology in providing novel insights in the mechanisms of action of vaccines to improve their design and effectiveness.
Financial and competing interests disclosure
The study was partially funded by Italian Ministry of Research through the project ‘Alleanza Contro il Cancro’ (Contract No. ACC 4) and through the Institutional ‘Ricerca Corrente’. 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.
No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.
Key issues
Systems vaccinology will improve our knowledge about the mechanisms of action of the current successful vaccines as well as enable the rational design and testing of novel vaccines.
Improvement in cancer vaccine efficacy will heavily depend on integrated systems vaccinology approach.
Gene transcriptional profiling has identified several predictors of immune response to vaccines for infectious diseases.
A ‘universal signature’ has not been identified, but shared signatures to vaccines of the same type are likely to be confirmed.
New technical advancements will foster development of ready-to-use chips for easy and rapid screening of vaccinees to improve the outcome of vaccination.