Improving the therapeutic immunity of cancer vaccine with multi-adjuvant polymeric nanoparticles

Head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) are an aggressive form of cancer attributes to 90% of all cancers in the head and neck area. Currently, chemo-immunotherapy is used as first line treatment for HNSCC patients. However, patients with advanced or recurrent HNSCC tumors respond poorly to this treatment, and there is therefore a need to develop a novel strategy to enhance the responsiveness of the HNSCC tumors to the current immunotherapy. Nanotechnology-based cancer vaccines offers an invaluable tool to tailor cancer vaccines to generate robust antitumor immune response against cancer cells in comparison to conventional delivery techniques. Polymer based nanoparticles are widely considered as better a nanoparticle system since they are non-toxic and have less side effects.

The aim of this project is to develop a polymer-based nanoparticles for the delivery of adjuvants (immune activators) and antigens and assess the antitumor-immune activity in the HNSCC mouse model. Under the guidance of Prof. Sebastien Perrier, the student (year 1) will design the polymeric nanoparticles and characterize their properties in vitro. Then, under the supervision of Dr. Shashi Prasad Rama, lead material candidates will be assessed in vivo (year 2 and 3), by developing HNSCC mouse models and characterizing the antitumor immunity. The students will learn about cutting edge tools to develop and characterize polymeric nanoparticles and further will gain skills on development of in vivo tumor animal models and various molecular biology techniques such as flow cytometry, ELISA, and immunohistochemistry etc. This project will be highly multidisciplinary, being based both at the University of Warwick and the University Hospital and provide an excellent support for the training of a student from materials science to preclinical research.