The present invention provides a combination preparation for inducing a specific immune response to an antigenic peptide, which contains (I) the antigenic peptide, and (II) an expression vector encoding a chimeric hepatitis B virus core antigen polypeptide, into which the antigenic peptide has been inserted or added, wherein said antigenic peptide is inserted in a region of amino acid residues 74-87 or 130-138 of the hepatitis B virus core antigen polypeptide, or added to the N-terminal or C-terminal of the hepatitis B virus core antigen polypeptide, wherein the antigenic peptide of (I) and the expression vector of (II) are substantially simultaneously administered to a subject.

The present invention relates to pharmaceutical compositions and a method of inhibiting metastasis using anti-ROR1 antibodies or antigen binding fragments, ROR1 binding peptides and ROR1 vaccines.

Protein antigens are provided. The protein antigens typically include a peptide antigen conjugated or fused to a chaperone protein to form a “chaperone-antigen” that increases lymph node uptake; improves an immune response; or a combination thereof relative to the peptide antigen alone. The immune response can be, for example, increased antigen-specific proliferation, enhanced cytokine production, stimulation of differentiation and/or effector functions, promotion of survival, rescue from exhaustion and/or anergy of T cells, or a combination thereof. Chaperon-antigens can also be used to induce tolerance and increase immune suppressive responses. In the most preferred embodiments, the peptide antigen is fused to the chaperone protein to form a fusion protein. The “chaperone-antigen” can be combined with an adjuvant to form a vaccine and administered to a subject to modulate an immune response to the antigen. Methods of increasing immune responses, treating cancer and infectious and inducing tolerance are also provided.

Pharmaceutical compositions and pharmaceutical combination preparations. The pharmaceutical compositions and the pharmaceutical combination preparations comprise at least one oxidative stressor selected from the group consisting of dithranol (anthralin, cignolin), or other anthrones or hydroxyanthracenes, at least one Toll-like receptor 7 (TLR7) ligand, and at least one peptide antigen. The pharmaceutical compositions or combination preparations may be used in the prevention or treatment of a persistent viral, bacterial or fungal infection or of cancer. The pharmaceutical compositions or combination preparations may find use for topical application on the skin of a human or animal body.

The present invention relates to peptides, nucleic acids and cells for use in immunotherapeutic methods. In particular, the present invention relates to the immunotherapy of cancer. The present invention furthermore relates to tumor-associated cytotoxic T cell (CTL) peptide epitopes, alone or in combination with other tumor-associated peptides that serve as active pharmaceutical ingredients of vaccine compositions that stimulate anti-tumor immune responses. The present invention relates to 30 peptide sequences and their variants derived from HLA class I and class II molecules of human tumor cells that can be used in vaccine compositions for eliciting anti-tumor immune responses.

Isolated peptides comprising one or more antigenic sites of filovirus glycoprotein and methods of their use and production are disclosed. Nucleic acid molecules encoding the peptides are also provided. In several embodiments, the peptides can be used to induce an immune response to filovirus glycoprotein, such as Zaire ebolavirus glycoprotein, in a subject, for example, to treat or prevent infection of the subject with the virus.

Disclosed are novel immunogenic proteins derived from Staphylococcus aureus, as well as methods for their use in conferring protective immunity against S. aureus infections. Also disclosed are nucleic acids encoding the proteins and methods of use of these nucleic acids.

The present invention relates to novel 2-ethylidene-1,5-dimethyl-3,3-diphenylpyrrolidine analogs, and methods for their synthesis and use. Such analogs are designed to provide a convenient linkage chemistry for coupling under mild conditions to a suitable group on a target protein, polypeptide, solid phase or detectable label.

Provided herein, in some embodiments, are vaccines (and vaccination methods) that include a ribonucleic acid (RNA) polynucleotide encoding a human metapneumovirus (hMPV) F protein and a RNA polynucleotide encoding a human parainfluenza virus 3 (hPIV3) F protein.

The present invention provides an immune enhancer comprising at least an interferon and a granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor, and an immunotherapeutic pharmaceutical composition comprising at least an antigen and the above-mentioned immune enhancers. The present invention further discloses a preparation method of the immunotherapeutic pharmaceutical composition, the use of the immune enhancer and the immunotherapeutic pharmaceutical composition. The immune enhancer can be applied to disease and tumor treatments caused by viruses, bacteria, and other microorganisms.