Dendritic cell-based therapeutic cancer vaccines: what we have and what we need.

Therapeutic cancer vaccines rely on the immune system to eliminate tumor cells. In contrast to chemotherapy or passive (adoptive) immunotherapies with antibodies or ex vivo-expanded T cells, therapeutic vaccines do not have a direct anti-tumor activity, but aim to reset patients' immune systems to achieve this goal. Recent identification of effective ways of enhancing immunogenicity of tumor-associated antigens, including the use of dendritic cells and other potent vectors of cancer vaccines, provide effective tools to induce high numbers of circulating tumor-specific T cells.