Department of Ophthalmology, The No. 944 Hospital of Joint Logistic Support Force of PLA, Gansu 735000, China; Pharmaceutical Sciences Research Division, Department of Pharmacy, Medical Supplies Centre, PLA General Hospital, Beijing 100853, China
Hui Gong
Medical School of Chinese PLA, Beijing 100853, China
Qi Sun
Pharmaceutical Sciences Research Division, Department of Pharmacy, Medical Supplies Centre, PLA General Hospital, Beijing 100853, China
Jinjin Yang
The Fifth medical center of Chinese PLA General Hospital, Beijing 100071, China
Xiaochuan Yan
Department of Ophthalmology, The No. 944 Hospital of Joint Logistic Support Force of PLA, Gansu 735000, China; Corresponding author.
Fenghua Xu
Pharmaceutical Sciences Research Division, Department of Pharmacy, Medical Supplies Centre, PLA General Hospital, Beijing 100853, China; Corresponding author.
Vaccination is the most cost-effective method for preventing various infectious diseases. Compared with conventional vaccines, new-generation vaccines, especially recombinant protein or synthetic peptide vaccines, are safer but less immunogenic than crude inactivated microbial vaccines. The immunogenicity of these vaccines can be enhanced using suitable adjuvants. This is the main reason why adjuvants are of great importance in vaccine development. Several novel human emulsion-based vaccine adjuvants (MF59, AS03) have been approved for clinical use. This paper reviews the research progress on emulsion-based adjuvants and focuses on their mechanism of action. An outlook can be provided for the development of emulsion-based vaccine adjuvants.
