An effector memory T cell-based therapeutic cervical cancer vaccine

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The longterm goal of this project is to utilize cytomegalovirus (CMV) vectors carrying oncogenes of high risk human papillomaviruses (HPV) as novel therapeutic vaccines against cervical cancer. Although recently launched prophylactic vaccines protect against HPV infection, these VLP-based vaccines have not demonstrated significant benefit for individuals who are already infected with HPV. Thus, there is an urgent need, and a sizable market, for a therapeutic HPV vaccinecapable of controlling or eliminating ongoing infections with HPV. However, the development of therapeutic HPV vaccines has been challenging since such a vaccine must generate sustained high level effector T cell responses in the cervical epithelium thatspecifically recognize the E6 and E7 non-structural proteins of high risk HPV. TomegaVax believes that CMV vectors are uniquely qualified for this task because CMV is the only known vector capable of inducing lifelong, high frequencies of effector mem