A Potential Herbal Adjuvant Combined With a Peptide-Based Vaccine Acts Against HPV-Related Tumors Through Enhancing Effector and Memory T-Cell Immune Responses

Viral infection is associated with many types of tumorigenesis, including human papillomavirus (HPV)-induced cervical cancer. The induction of a specific T-cell response against virus-infected cells is desired to develop an efficient therapeutic approach for virus-associated cancer. Chinese herbal medicine (CHM) has a long history in the treatment of cancer patients in Asian countries. Willd (Bai Hua She She Cao, BHSSC) is frequently used clinically and has been shown to inhibit tumor growth . However, data demonstrating the antitumor efficacy of BHSSC are still lacking. We showed that BHSSC induces murine and human antigen-presenting cell (APC) activation via the MAPK signaling pathway and enhances antigen presentation in bone marrow-derived dendritic cells (BMDCs) . Furthermore, we identified that treatment with BHSSC leads to improved specific effector and memory T-cell responses . Variant peptide-based vaccines combined with BHSSC improved antitumor activity in preventive, therapeutic, and recurrent HPV-related tumor models. Furthermore, we showed that rutin, one of the ingredients in BHSSC, induces a strong specific immune response against HPV-related tumors . In summary, we demonstrated that BHSSC extract and its active compound, rutin, can be used as adjuvants in peptide-based vaccines to increase immunogenicity and to bypass the requirement of a conditional adjuvant.