Research progress on tumor whole-cell vaccines prepared with nanoparticles for tumor immunotherapy

Tumor vaccines are a promising approach to activate patient’s own immune system to fight against tumor. Traditional tumor vaccines utilize tumor cells or tumor antigens to induce specific anti-tumor immune responses, inhibit tumor growth, and achieve the goal of tumor clearance. However, the currently developed tumor antigens are limited to identifying new antigens and focusing on stimulating or intervening in a designated target, which cannot achieve the cascade effect of tumor immunotherapy and leads to poor treatment outcomes. Therefore, an ideal tumor vaccine should effectively solve the problem of tumor heterogeneity and deliver tumor antigens to lymph nodes, promoting antigen uptake and presentation by antigen-presenting cells to stimulate T cell activation. In recent years, tumor whole-cell vaccines prepared by nanotechnology have emerged as a promising approach to transform the entire tumor into personalized tumor antigens without identifying and separating new antigens. These vaccines can achieve the cascade effect of tumor immunotherapy, effectively activating the patient’s own immune system. This paper aims to summarize and review the latest research progress on tumor whole-cell vaccines designed based on nanotechnology. The focus is on targeting key nodes in the process of tumor immunotherapy and gradually initiating these important nodes to achieve the cascade effect of tumor immunotherapy, thereby inhibiting tumor recurrence and metastasis.