Cloning variable region genes of clonal lymphoma immunoglobulin for generating patient-specific idiotype DNA vaccine.

Available therapies for lymphoplasmacytic lymphoma (LPL) provide no survival advantage if started before signs or symptoms of end-organ damage develop; hence, current recommendations are to follow a program of observation while patients are in the asymptomatic phase of disease. We hypothesize that using idiotypic determinants of a B-cell lymphoma's surface immunoglobulin as a tumor-specific marker, we can develop patient-specific chemokine-idiotype fusion DNA vaccines that induce an immune response against LPL. By activating the host immune system against the tumor antigen, we postulate that disease control of asymptomatic phase lymphoplasmacytic lymphoma can be maintained. These chemokine-idiotype fusion DNA vaccines provide protection in a lymphoma mouse model and have recently entered clinical trials. Herein, we describe procedures for the generation of therapeutic vaccines, particularly "second-generation" recombinant vaccines. Specifically, in the Methods section we describe how to identify lymphoma-associated immunoglobulin V (IgV) genes from patient biopsy and how to assemble these genes as single-chain variable gene fragment (scFv) in-frame with MIP-3α to generate novel DNA fusion vaccines.