Physiological Role of Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cells and Their Potential Use in Cancer Immunity

Dendritic cells (DCs) play a pivotal role in the control of innate and adaptive immune responses. They are a heterogeneous cell population, where plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs) are a unique subset capable of secreting high levels of type I IFNs. It has been demonstrated that pDCs can coordinate events during the course of viral infection, atopy, autoimmune diseases, and cancer. Therefore, pDC, as a main source of type I IFN, is an attractive target for therapeutic manipulations of the immune system to elicit a powerful immune response against tumor antigens in combination with other therapies. The therapeutic vaccination with antigen-pulsed DCs has shown a limited efficacy to generate an effective long-lasting immune response against tumor cells. A rational manipulation and design of vaccines which could include DC subsets outside “Langerhans cell paradigm” might allow us to improve the therapeutic approaches for cancer patients.