DNA vaccines: are they still just a powerful tool for the future?

Content Provider	Europe PMC
Author	Běláková, Jana Horynová, Milada Křupka, Michal Weigl, Evžen Raška, Milan
Abstract	Vaccination is historically one of the most successful strategies for the prevention of infectious diseases. For safety reasons, modern vaccinology tends toward the usage of inactivated or attenuated microorganisms and uses predominantly subunit vaccines. The antigens need to be clearly defined, pure, stable, appropriately composed, and properly presented to the immune system of the host. Differing ratios of various proportions between specific CD4+ and CD8+ T cell responses are essential for conferring the required protection in the case of individual vaccines. To stimulate both CD4+ and CD8+ T cells, the antigens must be processed and presented to both antigen-presentation pathways, MHC I and MHC II. Protein antigens delivered by vaccination are processed as extracellular antigens. However, extracellularly delivered antigen can be directed towards intracellular presentation pathways in conjugation with molecules involved in antigen cross-presentation, e.g. heat shock proteins, or by genomic-DNA vaccination. In this overview, current knowledge of the host immune response to DNA vaccines is summarized in the introduction. The subsequent sections discuss techniques for enhancing DNA vaccine efficacy, such as DNA delivery to specific tissues, delivery of DNA to the cell cytoplasm or nucleus, and enhancement of the immune response using molecular adjuvants. Finally, the prospects of DNA vaccination and ongoing clinical trials with various DNA vaccines are discussed.
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ISSN	0004069X
Journal	Archivum Immunologiae et Therapiae Experimentalis [Arch Immunol Ther Exp (Warsz)]
Volume Number	55
DOI	10.1007/s00005-007-0044-4
PubMed Central reference number	PMC7079751
Issue Number	6
PubMed reference number	18060369
e-ISSN	16614917
Language	English
Publisher	Birkhäuser-Verlag
Publisher Date	2007-11-01
Publisher Place	Basel
Access Restriction	Open
Rights License	This article is made available via the PMC Open Access Subset for unrestricted research re-use and secondary analysis in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for the duration of the World Health Organization (WHO) declaration of COVID-19 as a global pandemic. © Birkhaueser 2007
Subject Keyword	DNA vaccine plasmid delivery systems CTL MHC I MHC II
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article
Subject	Immunology and Allergy Immunology