BACKGROUND As a potent CD8(+) T cell activator, peptide vaccine has found its way in vaccine development against intracellular infections and cancer, but not against leishmaniasis. The first step toward a peptide vaccine is epitope mapping of different proteins according to the most frequent HLA types in a population. METHODS AND FINDINGS Six Leishmania (L.) major-related candidate antigens (...

1. Abstract 2. Introduction 3. Stress protein families and their immunological properties 3.1. Chaperoning properties 3.2. Peptide binding properties 3.3. Hsps interact with APCs 4. Immunogenicity of hsps 4.1. Tumor-derived hsp vaccines 4.2. Hsp-peptide based vaccines 4.3. Hsp-protein based vaccines 4.4. Hsp-based DNA vaccines 4.5. Hsp fusion protein vaccines 4.6. Cell-based vaccines 5. Improve...

BACKGROUND Cell mediated immunity, including efficient CTL response, is required to prevent HIV-1 from cell-to-cell transmission. In previous investigations, we have shown that B1 peptide derived by Fourier transformation of HIV-1 primary structures and sharing no sequence homology with the parent proteins was able to generate antiserum which recognizes envelope and Tat proteins. Here we have i...

Cancer peptide vaccination, as an immunotherapeutic approach against solid tumors, is currently employed in several clinical research protocols. The underlying mechanism of peptide-based vaccines involves the generation of a T-cell immune response against tumor or enhancement of an endogenous antitumor immunity pre-existing in the host [1]. Although the rationale of cancer vaccination studies s...

Cell division associated 1 (CDCA1) was screened as an oncogene that is overexpressed on several cancers, including prostate cancer. A highly immunogenic HLA-A*2402-restricted epitope peptide corresponding to part of the CDCA1 protein was also identified. A phase I clinical trial was conducted for patients with castration resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) using a CDCA1 peptide vaccination. Twelve...

T cell infiltration of melanoma is associated with enhanced clinical efficacy and is a desirable endpoint of immunotherapeutic vaccination. Infiltration is regulated, in part, by chemokine receptors and selectin ligands on the surface of tumor-specific lymphocytes. Therefore, we investigated the expression of two homing molecules--CXCR3 and CLA - on vaccine-induced CD8 T cells, in the context o...

Following numerous unequivocal clinical failures, immunotherapy has become an attractive therapeutic modality. Peptide vaccines are cost-effective compared to other vaccine approaches, and effective epitopes eliciting strong immune response can be selected experimentally in silico and ex vivo. However, the clinical benefits of cancer peptides vaccine have been disappointing in most studies; the...

An effective vaccine against the human immunodeficiency virus should be capable of eliciting both an antibody and a cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) response. However, when viral proteins and peptides are formulated with traditional immunological adjuvants and inoculated via a route acceptable for use in humans, they have not been successful at eliciting virus-specific, major histocompatibility com...

An effective vaccine against the human immunodeficiency virus should be capable of eliciting both an antibody and a cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) response. However, when viral proteins and peptides are formulated with traditional immunological adjuvants and inoculated via a route acceptable for use in humans, they have not been successful at eliciting virus-specific, major histocompatibility com...