Oncolytic Viral Means of Immune Stimulation
Oncolytic viruses with different properties have a different mode of action on tumor cells. (1) Non-replicating OVs bearing engineered transgenes allow the infected tumor cells to express those transgenes that trigger an immune response. (2) Replicating OVs lyses the infected tumor cells after infection; the released virus infects the neighboring tumor cells, making the treatment effective. (3) Non-lytic viruses engineered with transgenes integrate the transgene into the tumor cell genome upon infection; the infected cells then express the transgenes and mount an immune response. Because of genome integration, progeny tumor cells are also mitigated, as the integrated transgene is transferred from parental cells to progeny cells.