Lipo-Based Vaccines as an Approach to Target Dendritic Cells for Induction of T- and iNKT Cell Responses

In this study we developed a liposome-based vaccine containing palmitoylated synthetic long peptides (SLP) and alpha galactosylceramide (αGC) to specifically target dendritic cells (DC) for activation of both innate (invariant natural killer T-cells [iNKT]) and adaptive (CD8⁺ T-cells) players of the immune system. Combination of model tumor specific antigens (gp100/MART-1) formulated as a SLP and αGC in one liposome results in strong activation of CD8⁺ and iNKT, as measured by IFNγ secretion. Moreover, addition of lipo-Lewis Y (Le^Y) to the liposomes for C-type lectin targeting increased not only uptake by monocyte-derived dendritic cells (moDC), dermal dendritic cells and Langerhans cells but also enhanced gp100-specific CD8⁺ T- and iNKT cell activation by human skin-emigrated antigen presenting cells in an ex vivo explant model. Loading of moDC with liposomes containing Le^Y also showed priming of MART-1_26−35L specific CD8⁺ T-cells. In conclusion, chemically linking a lipid tail to a glycan-based targeting moiety and SLP combined with αGC in one liposome allows for easy generation of vaccine formulations that target multiple skin DC subsets and induce tumor antigen specific CD8⁺ T- and iNKT cells. These liposomes present a new vaccination strategy against tumors.