See related article by Fritsch et al., p. 522

Most human cancers acquire tens to hundreds of somatic mutations (termed the “tumor mutome”) during their development (1). Each of these mutations has the potential to generate one or more novel T-cell antigens (termed “neoepitopes”) uniquely specific to each individual patient's tumor. Because these neoepitopes are not present in the germline, and are not encountered until after the onset of oncogenesis, repertoires of high-avidity T cells capable of recognizing them may avoid central tolerance and escape deletion in the thymus. For these reasons, numerous investigators have proposed that the tumor mutome provides an attractive source of antigenic targets for developing patient-specific tumor vaccines (2–5).

Because it is already possible to rapidly and comprehensively identify tumor mutations using next-generation DNA- and RNA-sequencing technologies (1), the first technical hurdle for the development of this approach has been...

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