A Randomized, Controlled, Prospective Study on the Efficacy and Safety of Active Immunity Induced by Autologous Peptides for Maintenance Therapy in Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML)

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is the most common acute leukemia in adults. While approximately 70% of patients achieve complete remission (CR) with induction chemotherapy, traditional consolidation therapy (predominantly high-dose cytarabine) has a persistently high recurrence rate - nearly 30% at 1 year for low-risk groups and 80% for high-risk groups - with a long-term survival rate <40%. Allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT) improves survival but is limited by donor matching and patient tolerance, resulting in a transplantation rate <20%. Clinically, there is an urgent need for a well-tolerated, low hepatotoxic/nephrotoxic maintenance regimen effective for preventing recurrence.

Tumor immunotherapy is a major breakthrough, and neoantigen-based personalized vaccines are a key anti-recurrence direction due to their strong tumor specificity and ability to induce long-term immune memory. However, existing neoantigen vaccines rely on NGS sequencing and bioinformatics for epitope screening, suffering from long development cycles, high costs, proneness to missing cancer-causing mutations, and poor clinical feasibility, hindering widespread use. This study adopts a patented Sino-US innovative technology: in vitro induction of patients' own AML cells to obtain a complete set of tumor antigen peptides for personalized vaccine preparation, circumventing traditional bottlenecks to achieve "full antigen coverage" personalized active immunity.

This study has significant clinical and scientific value: (1) It is the first application of this patented technology in AML maintenance therapy, filling domestic and international research gaps and providing a novel treatment option; (2) Using a randomized controlled design, it compares the efficacy of immunotherapy administered during vs. after consolidation chemotherapy to identify the optimal treatment mode; (3) It screens reliable anti-leukemia immunity monitoring methods and time points, offering evidence-based support for efficacy evaluation and prognostic prediction; (4) It verifies the treatment's safety, laying a foundation for developing low-toxic, high-efficacy AML maintenance regimens, ultimately improving patients' long-term survival and advancing precision immunotherapy for AML.