1. ¹Department of Haematological Medicine, King's College London School of Medicine, The Rayne, Institute, London, UK
2. ²Department of Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA
3. ³Faculty of Medicine, Imperial College London, Hammersmith, Campus, London, UK
4. ⁴Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina, USA
5. ⁵Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center, San Diego, California, USA

Correspondence: Barbara-ann Guinn, Department of Haematological Medicine, King's College London School of Medicine, The Rayne Institute, 123 Coldharbour Lane, London SE5 9NU, UK. E-mail: barbara.guinn@kcl.ac.uk

^*These authors contributed equally to this work.

Received 30 October 2006; Accepted 8 February 2007; Published online 20 March 2007.

Abstract

Despite advances in animal studies, where the cure of the majority of mice with pre-established (albeit early-stage) tumors has become almost standard, human clinical trials have been much less successful. Here we describe some of the most recent advances in the specialist field of tumor immunology and immunotherapy, highlighting salient work to identify key problem areas and potential solutions. We make particular note of recent developments in adoptive therapy; whole-cell, DNA, and peptide vaccines; and antibody therapy. We also describe the revival of interest in regulatory T cells and conclude by detailing the need for clinical trial read-out autonomy and methods to predict which patients will respond to a particular treatment.