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Tokuyasu et al. J Cancer Metastasis Treat 2018;4:2                  Journal of Cancer
               DOI: 10.20517/2394-4722.2017.52                           Metastasis and Treatment




               Review                                                                        Open Access


               A primer on recent developments in cancer
               immunotherapy, with a focus on neoantigen
               vaccines


               Taku A. Tokuyasu , Jian-Dong Huang 1,2,3
                              1
               1 Institute of Synthetic Biology, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen 518055,
               Guangdong, China.
               2 School of Biomedical Sciences, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China.
               3 Shenzhen Institute of Research and Innovation, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China.

               Correspondence to: Dr. Taku A. Tokuyasu, Institute of Synthetic Biology, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese
               Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen 518055, Guangdong, China. E-mail: tokbio@fastmail.fm

               How to cite this article: Tokuyasu TA, Huang JD. A primer on recent developments in cancer immunotherapy, with a focus on neoantigen
               vaccines. J Cancer Metastasis Treat 2018;4:2. http://dx.doi.org/10.20517/2394-4722.2017.52

               Received: 8 Aug 2017    First Decision: 18 Oct 2017    Revised: 11 Dec 2017    Accepted: 11 Dec 2017    Published: 18 Jan 2018
               Science Editor: Shuen-Kuei Liao    Copy Editor: Lu Liu    Production Editor: Huan-Liang Wu



               Abstract
               Cancer immunotherapy has now been conclusively shown to be capable of producing durable responses for a substantial
               number of patients. Adoptive cell transfer and checkpoint blockade therapies in particular both demonstrate that
               antigen-specific immune responses can be dramatically effective, even in previously refractory late stage disease. Such
               developments, together with advances in technology, have strongly encouraged revisiting the concept of neoantigen
               vaccines. Here we introduce basic ideas in the field to allow investigators from diverse backgrounds to understand these
               developments, grasp current issues, and contribute to further progress.


               Keywords: Immunotherapy, cancer vaccine, immunoinformatics, precision medicine, combination therapy, theoretical
               models, systems biology




               INTRODUCTION
                                    [1]
               In the late 1800s, Coley  pursued investigations of cancer regression in the context of bacterial disease.
               It has been clear since then that the immune system plays an important role in cancer. Over the ensuing
               century, strong arguments were put forward for both why cancer immunotherapy should work and why it
                                                         [2]
               should not, occasionally by the same investigator . The past decade has seen dramatic progress in cancer
               immunotherapies, such as checkpoint blockade, adoptive cell transfer, and vaccines. The success came on

                           © The Author(s) 2018. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0
                           International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use,
                sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, for any purpose, even commercially, as long
                as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license,
                and indicate if changes were made.


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