Towards Clinical Implementation of Adeno-Associated Virus (AAV) Vectors for Cancer Gene Therapy: Current Status and Future Perspectives

Abstract

Adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors have gained tremendous attention as in vivo delivery systems in gene therapy for inherited monogenetic diseases. First market approvals, excellent safety data, availability of large-scale production protocols, and the possibility to tailor the vector towards optimized and cell-type specific gene transfer offers to move from (ultra) rare to common diseases. Cancer, a major health burden for which novel therapeutic options are urgently needed, represents such a target. We here provide an up-to-date overview of the strategies which are currently developed for the use of AAV vectors in cancer gene therapy and discuss the perspectives for the future translation of these pre-clinical approaches into the clinic.

Keywords

• adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors
• transductional targeting
• transcriptional targeting
• hallmarks of cancer
• apoptosis
• tumor angiogenesis