Generation of carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA)-specific T-cell responses in HLA-A*0201 and HLA-A*2402 late-stage colorectal cancer patients after vaccination with dendritic cells loaded with CEA peptides.

PURPOSE

We intranodally immunized metastatic colorectal carcinoma patients, who had failed standard chemotherapy, with dendritic cells (DCs) pulsed with HLA-A0201- or HLA-A2402-restricted carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) peptides to evaluate the safety of this treatment and the immune response against CEA peptides before and after the treatment.

EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN

Six patients with the HLA-A2402 genotype and 4 patients with the HLA-A0201 genotype were enrolled. A single CEA peptide (YLSGANLNL) or two CEA peptides (QYSWFVNGTF and TYACFVSNL) were used for patients with the HLA-A0201 or HLA-A2402 genotype, respectively. Autologous DCs were generated by culturing adherent mononuclear cells with interleukin 4 and granulocyte macrophage colony-stimulating factor for 6 days. Maturation of DCs was then induced with tumor necrosis factor alpha for 40 h. Mature DCs were pulsed with appropriate CEA peptides for 2 h. After washing, 1 million peptide-pulsed DCs were injected into one inguinal lymph node under sonographic guidance. Each patient received four injections.

RESULTS

No grade II/III toxicity or autoimmunity was observed. An increase in the number of CEA-specific T cells after DC vaccination could be detected in 7 of 10 (70%) patients. Two (20%) patients had stable disease for at least 12 weeks. One of these 2 patients experienced a transient decrease in CEA levels during the treatment period and also had the most significant T-cell response against the immunizing CEA peptides.

CONCLUSIONS

These results suggest that our vaccination procedure can generate or boost specific T-cell responses and may provide clinical benefit in certain cancer patients.