Cancer vaccines have attracted widespread interest in tumor therapy because of the potential to induce an effective antitumor immune response. However, many challenges including weak immunogenicity, off-target effects, and immunosuppressive microenvironments have prevented their broad clinical translation. To overcome these difficulties, effective delivery systems have been designed for cancer vaccines. As carriers in cancer vaccine delivery systems, hydrogels have gained substantial attention because they can encapsulate a variety of antigens/immunomodulators and protect them from degradation. This enables hydrogels to simultaneously reverse immunosuppression and stimulate the immune response. Meanwhile, the controlled release properties of hydrogels allow for precise temporal and spatial release of loads in situ to further enhance the immune response of cancer vaccines. Therefore, this review summarizes the classification of cancer vaccines, highlights the strategies of hydrogel-based cancer vaccines, and provides some insights into the future development of hydrogel-based cancer vaccines.
Author Info:
(1) National Engineering Research Center for Biomaterials, College of Biomedical Engineering, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610064, P. R. China. Key Laboratory of Drug-Targeting and
Drug Delivery System of the Education Ministry and Sichuan Province, Sichuan Engineering Laboratory for Plant-Sourced Drug and Sichuan Research Center for Drug Precision Industrial Technology, West China School of Pharmacy, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610041, P. R. China. (2) Department of Biomedical Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA. Institute for Biomaterials, Drug Delivery, and Regenerative Medicine, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA. (3) Key Laboratory of Drug-Targeting and Drug Delivery System of the Education Ministry and Sichuan Province, Sichuan Engineering Laboratory for Plant-Sourced Drug and Sichuan Research Center for Drug Precision Industrial Technology, West China School of Pharmacy, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610041, P. R. China. (4) National Engineering Research Center for Biomaterials, College of Biomedical Engineering, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610064, P. R. China. (5) National Engineering Research Center for Biomaterials, College of Biomedical Engineering, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610064, P. R. China. (6) Department of Biomedical Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA. Institute for Biomaterials, Drug Delivery, and Regenerative Medicine, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA. Department of Chemical Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA. Division of Molecular Pharmaceutics and Drug Delivery, College of Pharmacy, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA. Departments of Pediatrics, Surgery, and Perioperative Care, Dell Medical School, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA.
Citation: Sci Adv 2022 Nov 25 8:eadc8738 Epub11/25/2022
