Priming and Activation of Human Ovarian and Breast Cancer-specific CD8+ T Cells by Polyvalent Listeria monocytogenes-based Vaccines

Abstract

Immunotherapeutic vaccine is potentially an effective strategy to combat cancer. Essential components of an effective vaccine must include antigens that are processed by the major histocompatibility complex class I pathway, presented by the tumor major histocompatibility complex molecules, and an effective antigen delivery platform that is capable of breaking self-tolerance. In this study, we characterized a set of ovarian cancer-specific T-cell epitopes delivered by live-attenuated recombinant Listeria monocytogenes (Lm DeltaactADeltainlB) as a vaccine vector. We present data that peptide-specific T cells recognize the human monocytic cell line THP-1 infected with recombinant Lm DeltaactADeltainlB encoding the epitopes. Furthermore, we demonstrate that recombinant L. monocytogenes (Lm)-infected antigen-presenting cells can prime and expand epitope-specific CD8 T cells in vitro and such CD8 T cells recognize not only peptide-loaded targets but also ovarian and breast tumor cells presenting endogenous epitopes. Finally, peptide-specific T cells generated using peripheral blood mononuclear cell from ovarian cancer patients recognize target cells infected with recombinant Lm DeltaactADeltainlB encoding the epitopes. Our results demonstrate that live-attenuated recombinant Lm can be used effectively as a vehicle to deliver cancer peptide antigens singly or as a multiepitope construct. Thus, the use of recombinant live-attenuated Lm strains encoding endogenously processed and presented tumor epitopes/antigens represents an attractive strategy for active cancer immunotherapy in a clinical setting.