Expansion of Immunostimulatory Dendritic Cells from Peripheral Blood of Patients with Cancer

Clinical investigators are keenly interested in the role of antigen-presenting cells (APCs) in the initiation of immune responses because of potential use of APCs in immune cell therapy. Pioneer studies in mammals by Steinman and coworkers have demonstrated that the specialized system of APCs is constituted by bone marrow-derived dendritic cells. Dendritic cells are distinguished by their unique ability to capture, process, and present antigens into peptide-HLA complexes to naive T lymphocytes and to deliver the costimulatory signal necessary for T-lymphocyte activation. In this article, we summarize the main experimental evidence supporting the hypothesis that individuals vaccinated with manipulated dendritic cells can mount tumor-specific humoral and cellular responses. This can lead to tumor regression as well as protective immunity to tumor growth in vivo.