Immunicum's technology is based on allogeneic DCs, showing that said type of cells function as great immune boosters in cancer immunotherapy

The core-concept is based on over 20 years of research within the area of transplantation immunology. Its innovators were originally researching the mechanisms behind rejection of transplanted organs when they realized that the strong rejection process could be utilized to develop vaccines against cancer and infectious diseases. Allogeneic APCs (including monocytes and DCs) are the main orchestrators of rejection of transplanted organs, which Immunicum takes advantage of for the development of what is thought to be a superior vaccine. By using the rejection process as adjuvant also for immunization against concurrently injected tumor antigens, significant antitumor responses have been demonstrated in rat cancer models.

The following is a description of the core-concept (see figure below): White blood cells from healthy donors (allogeneic DCs) are loaded with tumor specific antigens in vitro and treated with activating factors. Since the vaccine cells can be loaded with different antigens, it is possible to tailor the vaccines for therapeutic treatment of all types of cancers. Immunicum takes advantage of the fact that DCs can be activated to produce high levels of NK, NKT and T-cell recruiting chemokines in a sustained fashion (Gustafsson et al, Cancer Research, 2008). If the injected DCs are allogeneic, the interaction between these injected DCs and recruited lymphocytes will further create a highly inflammatory milieu (corresponding to an allogeneic mixed leucocyte reaction/MLR) at the vaccination site, containing several inflammatory mediators that are capable of recruiting the patients’ own monocytes and subsequently also capable of maturing these into highly activated DCs (Wallgren et al, Scand J Immunol, 2005). The patients’ recruited DCs will then engulf the invading allogeneic vaccine cells and in this way become loaded with tumor specific antigens. Thus, the inflammation that allogeneic DCs superiorly induce is used to recruit, activate, and load the patients’ own DCs with tumor antigens in vivo instead of artificially in vitro. This “natural” activation is expected to optimally prepare the patients’ own DCs for migration to the draining lymph nodes where they can trigger the immune system against cancer.

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