The present invention provides a method for preparing dendritic cell loaded with antigen, the method comprising the steps of adding serum-free cell culture medium containing granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) and inter-leukin (IL)-4 into mononuclear cells, culturing in an incubator at 37° C. under 5% carbon dioxide for 5 days, adding target antigen wrapped cationic liposome and culturing for 8-24 hours to obtain target antigen loaded dendritic cell.

Compositions and methods are provided for converting the predominant circulating classical monocytes to a non-classical and/or intermediate monocyte phenotype through cytokine stimulation via, for example, macrophage colony-stimulating factor. Once cultured into dendritic cells, these non-classical and/or intermediate monocyte derived cells have increased costimulatory molecule expression, which leads to improved immune and clinical responses in cancer patients receiving dendritic cell vaccination and other immunotherapies. In addition, assays and diagnostic and theranostic methods are provided herein that relate to the discoveries that, prior to treatment, intermediate (CD14+CD16+) and non-classical (CD14dimCD16+) monocytes are increased more than two-fold in patients who later had complete responses to dendritic cell therapy or DC vaccination.

In some embodiments, compositions and methods relating to isolated artificial antigen presenting cells (aAPCs) are disclosed, including aAPCs comprising a myeloid cell transduced with one or more viral vectors, such as a MOLM-14 or a EM-3 myeloid cell, wherein the myeloid cell endogenously expresses HLA-AB/C, ICOS-L, and CD58, and wherein the one or more viral vectors comprise a nucleic acid encoding CD86 and a nucleic acid encoding 4-1BBL and/or OX40L and transduce the myeloid cell to express CD86 and 4-1BBL and/or OX40L proteins. In some embodiments, methods of expanding tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) with aAPCs and methods of treating cancers using TILs after expansion with aAPCs are also disclosed.

The present invention relates to a method for inducing and amplifying specific effectors, which comprises obtaining pulsed plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDC) by incubation of a pDC line with at least one antigen, the pulsed pDC being subsequently irradiated and brought into contact with peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC), and cultured or injected into an organism. The pulsed and irradiated pDC and the PBMC share at least one major histocompatibility complex (MHC) allele.

The disclosure provides a method of new use of an immunomodulatory drug comprising a water-soluble acidic peptidoglycan from sprouts of the plant Solanum tuberosum (WSPG) for prevention and treatment of metastatic tumor growth, comprising an application of a therapeutically effective dose of a said immunomodulatory drug or a pharmaceutical composition of a said immunomodulatory drug with a pharmaceutically acceptable carrier or excipient, or a pharmaceutically effective amount of mammalian immune cells treated with said immunomodulatory drug WSPG in vitro/ex vivo to a patient in need thereof.

The present invention provides peptides containing the amino acid sequence of SEQ ID NOs: 1, 2, 3, 4, 16, 17, 30, 31, 34, 36, 37, 40, 41, 45, 49, 55, 57 and 61, as well as peptides containing the above-mentioned amino acid sequences in which 1, 2, or several amino acid(s) are substituted, deleted, inserted or added, but still have cytotoxic T cell inducibility. The present invention also provides drugs for treating or preventing tumors, which drugs containing these peptides. The peptides of the present invention can also be used as vaccines.

Dendritic cells containing tumor lysate loaded particles are prepared. The dendritic cells present tumor antigens to elicit the Major Histocompatibility Complex class I pathway and can be used as a vaccine to treat cancer, including ocular melanoma.

Methods and compositions disclosed herein relate to cancer immunotherapy, in particular preparation and use of antigen-specific T lymphocytes for immune cell therapies. Methods and compositions disclosed herein relate to the production of antigen-presenting cells and their use cell therapy and vaccines and, in particular, the preparation and use of antigen-specific T lymphocytes for cancer immunotherapies.

The present invention relates to tolerogenic mammalian dendritic cells (iDCs) and methods for the production of tolerogenic DCs. In addition, the present invention provides methods for administration of tolerogenic dendritic cells as well as particles containing oligonucleotides to mammalian subjects. Enhanced tolerogenicity in a host can be useful for treating inflammatory and autoimmune related diseases, such as type 1 diabetes.

The present embodiments relate to an FDA-approved injectable multi-dose antigen pulsed dendritic cell (DC) vaccine. In one embodiment, the activated antigen-loaded DC vaccine comprises an initial immunizing dose and multiple “booster” doses. Also provided is a method of blocking both HER-2 and HER-3 as a treatment in causing permanent tumor senescence in HER-2 expressing breast cancers. Also provided is combination anti-estrogen therapy and anti-HER2 dendritic call vaccination for ER.sup.pos/HER2.sup.pos DCIS breast cancer patients.