Dendritic Cell-Based Immunotherapy Treatment for Glioblastoma Multiforme

Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is the most malignant glioma and patients diagnosed with this disease had poor outcomes even treated with the combination of conventional treatment (surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation). Dendritic cells (DCs) are the most powerful antigen presenting cells and DC-based vaccination has the potential to target and eliminate GBM cells and enhance the responses of these cells to the existing therapies with minimal damage to the healthy tissues around them. It can enhance recognition of GBM cells by the patients' immune system and activate vast, potent, and long-lasting immune reactions to eliminate them. Therefore, this therapy can prolong the survival of GBM patients and has wide and bright future in the treatment of GBM. Also, the efficacy of this therapy can be strengthened in several ways at some degree: the manipulation of immune regulatory components or costimulatory molecules on DCs; the appropriate choices of antigens for loading to enhance the effectiveness of the therapy; regulation of positive regulators or negative regulators in GBM microenvironment.