Current status and future perspectives of dendritic cell-based cancer immunotherapy.

Dendritic cells (DCs) are considered to be the most potent antigen-presenting cells. Ever since the development of protocols for the in vitro generation of DCs, their application in immunotherapy against various malignancies has been explored. Even though the approach of using tumour antigen-presenting DCs in therapeutic vaccination strategies has been shown to work effectively in mice and look promising in in vitro studies, the actual clinical benefit for patients with cancer has been marginal. There clearly is still room for improvement. In this review, we will summarize recent clinical trials and findings and try to shed some light on the current status and the future of DC-based cancer immunotherapy.