Despite their potential, conventional whole-cell
cancer vaccines prepared by freeze-thawing or irradiation have shown limited therapeutic efficacy in clinical trials. Recent studies have indicated that
cancer cells treated with certain chemotherapeutics, such as
mitoxantrone, can undergo immunogenic cell death (ICD) and initiate antitumor immune responses. However, it remains unclear how to exploit ICD for
cancer immunotherapy. Here, we present a new material-based strategy for converting immunogenically dying
tumor cells into a powerful platform for
cancer vaccination and demonstrate their therapeutic potential in murine models of
melanoma and colon
carcinoma. We have generated immunogenically dying
tumor cells surface-modified with adjuvant-loaded nanoparticles. Dying
tumor cells laden with adjuvant nanodepots efficiently promote activation and
antigen cross-presentation by dendritic cells in vitro and elicit robust
antigen-specific CD8α+ T-cells in vivo. Furthermore, whole
tumor-cell vaccination combined with
immune checkpoint blockade leads to complete
tumor regression in ∼78% of CT26
tumor-bearing mice and establishes long-term immunity against
tumor recurrence. Our strategy presented here may open new doors to "personalized"
cancer immunotherapy tailored to individual patient's
tumor cells.