Bedside formulation of a personalized multi-neoantigen vaccine against mammary carcinoma

Abstract Figure Graphical abstract Individualized neoantigen vaccination against mammary carcinoma Background Harnessing the immune system to purposely recognize and destroy tumours represents a significant breakthrough in clinical oncology. Nonsynonymous mutations (neoantigenic peptides) were identified as powerful cancer targets. This knowledge can be exploited for further improvements of active immunotherapies, including cancer vaccines as T cells specific for neoantigens are not attenuated by immune tolerance mechanism and do not harm healthy tissues. The current study aimed at developing an optimized multi-target vaccine using short or long neoantigenic peptides utilizing virus-like particles (VLPs) as an efficient vaccine platform. Methods Here we identified mutations of murine mammary carcinoma cells by integrating mass spectrometry-based immunopeptidomics and whole exome sequencing. Neoantigenic peptides were synthesized and covalently linked to virus-like nanoparticles using a Cu-free click-chemistry method for easy preparation of vaccines against mouse mammary carcinoma. Results As compared to short peptides, vaccination with long peptides was superior in the generation of neoantigen-specific CD4 + and CD8 + T cells which readily produced IFN-γ and TNF-α. The resulting anti-tumour effect was associated with favourable immune re-polarization in the tumour microenvironment through reduction of myeloid-derived suppressor cells. Vaccination with long neoantigenic peptides also decreased post-surgical tumour recurrence and metastases, and prolonged mouse survival, despite the tumour’s low mutational burden. Conclusion Integrating mass spectrometry-based immunopeptidomics and whole exome-sequencing is an efficient technique for identifying neoantigenic peptides. A multi-target VLP-based vaccine shows a promising anti-tumour results in an aggressive murine mammary carcinoma cell line. Future clinical application using this strategy is readily feasible and practical, as click-chemistry coupling of personalized synthetic peptides to the nanoparticles can be done at the bedside directly before injection.