Emek Köse
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Saint Mary’s College of Maryland, St. Mary’s City, MD, USA
Sharon Moore
Department of Computer Science Baylor University, Waco, TX, USA
Chinenye Ofodile
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Albany State University, Albany, GA, USA
Ami Radunskaya
Department of Mathematics Pomona College, Claremont, CA, USA
Ellen R. Swanson
Department of Mathematics Centre College, Danville, KY, USA
Elizabeth Zollinger
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Saint Joseph’s College, Brooklyn, NY, USA
Therapeutic vaccines play a large role in the cast of immunotherapies that are now an essential component in most cancer treatment regimes. The complexity of the immune response and the ability of the tumour to mount a counter-offensive to this response have made it difficult to predict who will respond to what treatments, and for clinicians to optimise treatment strategies for individual patients. In this paper, we present a mathematical model that captures the dynamics of the adaptive response to an autologous whole-cell cancer vaccine, without some of the complexities of previous models that incorporate delays. Model simulations are compared to published experimental and clinical data, and used to discuss possible improvements to vaccine design.
