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Review
. 2023 Aug;13(8):e1384.
doi: 10.1002/ctm2.1384.

mRNA vaccine in cancer therapy: Current advance and future outlook

Youhuai Li  1 , Mina Wang  2   3 , Xueqiang Peng  4 , Yingying Yang  5 , Qishuang Chen  2 , Jiaxing Liu  4 , Qing She  1 , Jichao Tan  1 , Chuyuan Lou  6 , Zehuan Liao  7   8 , Xuexin Li  9
Affiliations
Review

mRNA vaccine in cancer therapy: Current advance and future outlook

Youhuai Li et al. Clin Transl Med. 2023 Aug.

Abstract

Messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) vaccines are a relatively new class of vaccines that have shown great promise in the immunotherapy of a wide variety of infectious diseases and cancer. In the past 2 years, SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccines have contributed tremendously against SARS-CoV2, which has prompted the arrival of the mRNA vaccine research boom, especially in the research of cancer vaccines. Compared with conventional cancer vaccines, mRNA vaccines have significant advantages, including efficient production of protective immune responses, relatively low side effects and lower cost of acquisition. In this review, we elaborated on the development of cancer vaccines and mRNA cancer vaccines, as well as the potential biological mechanisms of mRNA cancer vaccines and the latest progress in various tumour treatments, and discussed the challenges and future directions for the field.

Keywords: cancer; cancer vaccine; immunology; immunotherapy; mRNA vaccine.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Timeline: Breakthroughs in mRNA vaccine research and its progress in cancer therapy.
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
mRNA vaccines‐based immune response. Similar to virus infection, after the mRNA vaccine enters the cell through endocytosis, it transiently expresses and accumulates antigens in the cytoplasm, and then these antigens are efficiently processed into peptides and loaded on MHC‐I molecules. On the other hand, the protein expressed by mRNA can also activate the MHC‐II pathway after secretion and circulation or directly deliver the antigen from the cytoplasm to the lysosome. Therefore, it can stimulate cellular and humoral immune responses at the same time and play a better protective role.
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
Various representative classes of mRNA‐based vaccine delivery systems. (A) Lipid‐based delivery systems. (B) Polymer‐based delivery systems. (C) Polypeptidic‐based delivery systems. (D) Hybrid‐based delivery systems. (E) Virus‐based delivery systems. (F) Other systems.
FIGURE 4
FIGURE 4
Different strategies for the administration of mRNA vaccines. 1. Intramuscular injection: LPTX‐COVID19‐B (NCT04765436 ), mRNA‐1273 (NCT04860297). 2. Intraocular injection: mRNA‐5671 (NCT03948763), ECI‐006 (NCT03394937). 3. Intravenous injection:CV9202 (NCT03164772), BNT111 (NCT04526899), TriMix (NCT01066390). 4. Intratumoural injection: OX40L (NCT03739931, NCT03323398), BNT‐114, BNT‐122 (NCT02316457). 5. Intrathecal injection: NR2B. 6. Subcutaneous and intradermal injection: Subcutaneous injection: mRNA‐1608, mRNA‐1468mRNA‐4359. Intradermal injection:CV9202 (NCT03164772), TriMix(NCT01066390), mRNA‐1608, mRNA‐1468, mRNA‐4359.
FIGURE 5
FIGURE 5
Production process of mRNA vaccines and structure of mRNA and nucleotide modifications. (A) Identification and design of a target antigen. (2) Digital sequence design. (3) Manufacturing of plasmid, mRNA and LNP. (4) Quality control (QC). (B) mRNA molecules are synthesized with a 5′‐cap one structure and chemically modified nucleotides as substitutes for natural nucleotides.
FIGURE 6
FIGURE 6
mRNA vaccines have great potential in the treatment of many diseases. 1. Metabolic disease: Diabetes, diabetic ketoacidosis, scurvy. 2. Tumour: Melanoma, breast cancer, pancreatic cancer, hepatocellular carcinoma. 3. Genetic diseases: Down syndrome, albinism. 4. Allergic diseases: allergic asthma, allergic purpura. 5. Vascular disease: arteriosclerosis, cardiovascular disease, cerebrovascular disease. 6. Infectious diseases: Zika virus, HIV, Covid‐2019, Ebola.
FIGURE 7
FIGURE 7
The role of mRNA vaccines in tumour immunity.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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