Are 'Onco-Antigens' Good Cancer Targets?

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Perspective

Nature Reviews Cancer 7, 707-713 (September 2007) | doi:10.1038/nrc2208

Opinion: Are oncoantigens suitable targets for anti-tumour therapy?

Federica Cavallo1, Raffaele Adolfo Calogero1 & Guido Forni1 About the

authors

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Abstract

When a vaccine-elicited immune response is directed against

oncoantigens — proteins required for the neoplastic process — the

chance that the tumour will evade the vaccine should be reduced.

But how can these causal oncoantigens be identified? One approach is

to find tumour-associated and microenvironment-associated oncoantigens

required for progression from one tumour stage to the next by

comparing gene signatures isolated from the different stages of tumour

progression in cancer-prone transgenic mice. Mouse oncoantigens

subsequently shown to be involved in human cancer can then be

validated in mouse vaccination experiments.

This provides the groundwork for the rational design of cancer

vaccines for clinical trials.