Cancer immunotherapy for pancreatic cancer utilizing α-gal epitope/natural anti-Gal antibody reaction

Figure 6 Concept of effective vaccination with α-gal tumor lysate against pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. A tumor lysate is a more suitable source of tumor-associated antigens (TAAs) because it contains several known and unknown antigens in cancer cells and stromal cells that can elicit a broad-spectrum anti-tumor immune response. Moreover, the primary tumor of pancreatic adenocarcinoma contains a subset of pancreatic cancer cells with stem cell properties (i.e., pancreatic cancer stem cells: pancreatic CSCs). To increase the immunogenicity of known and unknown TAAs, CSC markers, or TAAs contained in cancer stromal cells to antigen-presenting cells, anti-Gal bound to α-gal-expressing TAAs could be a suitable strategy.