Spring 2025
By Kathy Clute
Photography by Sam Ogden
Funds raised through The Dana-Farber Campaign are speeding our efforts to amplify the powerful benefits of immunotherapies, including a vaccine developed by Institute scientists that harnesses the body’s immune system to attack cancerous cells. This personalized cancer vaccine, called NeoVax, has been effective in melanoma patients and is now being studied for its potential to defeat other cancers.
NeoVax works by targeting the unique mutations in a patient’s tumor. After genetic sequencing identifies specific neoantigens—proteins formed by the mutations—scientists use copies of them to create a personalized vaccine. The vaccine trains the body’s immune system to seek out and destroy cells displaying the neoantigens while leaving normal ones intact.
The technology is so promising that Dana-Farber established the Center for Cancer Vaccines in 2020, led by the vaccine’s developers, Catherine Wu, MD, Lavine Family Chair for Preventative Cancer Therapies at Dana-Farber, and Patrick Ott, MD, PhD.
Wu and other Dana-Farber researchers are now investigating whether NeoVax, paired with additional medicines, might be effective against chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), high-risk renal cell carcinoma, glioblastoma, and ovarian cancer. They are also working to develop AMPVax (Artificial Mini-Proteome Vaccine), a next-generation cancer vaccine that overcomes two current barriers to widespread NeoVax use: production costs and time.