Genetic vaccination strategies for enhanced cellular, humoral and mucosal immunity

In this article, we describe several novel genetic vaccination strategies designed to facilitate the development of different types of immune responses. These include: i) the consecutive use of DNA and fowlpoxvirus vectors in 'prime-boost' strategies which induce greatly enhanced and sustained levels of both cell-mediated immunity and humoral immunity, including mucosal responses; ii) the co-expression of genes encoding cytokines and cell-surface receptors, and the use of immunogenic carrier molecules, for immune modulation and/or improved targeting of vector-expressed vaccine antigens; and iii) the expression of minimal immunogenic amino acid sequences, particularly cytotoxic CD8⁺ T-cell determinants, in 'polytope' vector vaccines. The capacity to modulate and enhance specific immune responses by the use of approaches such as these may underpin the development of vaccines against diseases for which no effective strategies are currently available.