ASCO 2026 | The future of personalized and off-the-shelf mRNA vaccines in melanoma
James Smithy, MD, MHS, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY, discusses the potential of mRNA vaccines in melanoma, particularly in combination with checkpoint blockade. mRNA vaccines are broadly either personalized vaccination based on neoantigens such as intismeran autogene and off-the-shelf vaccines targeting immunosuppressive cells or other antigens. Additional vaccines of interest include IO102-IO103 and mRNA-4359. This interview took place during the 2026 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Meeting in Chicago, IL.
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Transcript
Yeah, so I’m really excited about the potential for mRNA vaccines in melanoma, especially in combination with checkpoint blockade. And I think there are two big groups of mRNA vaccines. So one is personalized vaccination that’s based on the neoantigens in a patient’s tumor. And so we’re all very much looking forward to results from the phase three Intismaran adjuvant study...
Yeah, so I’m really excited about the potential for mRNA vaccines in melanoma, especially in combination with checkpoint blockade. And I think there are two big groups of mRNA vaccines. So one is personalized vaccination that’s based on the neoantigens in a patient’s tumor. And so we’re all very much looking forward to results from the phase three Intismaran adjuvant study. And I think if that’s positive, that’ll open a lot of opportunities for that approach in other settings. The other big bucket, and kind of related to what we presented here at ASCO, are off-the-shelf vaccines that target perhaps immunosuppressive cells or other antigens. Though the IO-102, IO-103 vaccine I presented here is a peptide vaccine, there’s an ongoing program with mRNA 4359, which is an mRNA-based version of the same targeted vaccine. And so excited to see results from earlier stage trials of both previously untreated as well as PD-1 refractory melanoma going forward. So lots to come hopefully in the coming year or two with these types of agents.
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