Cancer is a life-threatening disease, and immunotherapies have been developed as a novel, potent treatment for cancer. Adjuvants, used alone or in combination with other agents, play crucial roles in immune activation. This is necessary for cancer immunotherapy, particularly in the construction of therapeutic cancer vaccines. Adjuvants activate antigen-presenting cells and promote the presentation of antigen epitopes on major histocompatibility complex molecules, further enhancing adaptive immune responses, including cytotoxic T lymphocytes, to elicit cancer-cell death. However, the applications of adjuvants are limited by their poor efficacy or insufficient safety. In recent studies, researchers attempted to develop safe, efficacious adjuvants for cancer immunotherapy, and many compounds (including inorganic compounds, organic molecules, polymers, and colloids) have been identified and optimized as agonists of various pathways. In this review, we focus on the discovery and structural design of emerging adjuvants and discuss how these findings benefit healthcare.

癌症是威胁生命的疾病，免疫疗法已被开发为一种新颖，有效的癌症治疗方法。单独使用或与其他药物结合使用的佐剂在免疫激活中起关键作用。这对于癌症免疫治疗是必要的，特别是在治疗性癌症疫苗的构建中。佐剂激活抗原呈递细胞并促进抗原表位在主要组织相容性复合物分子上的呈递，从而进一步增强包括细胞毒性T淋巴细胞在内的适应性免疫应答，以引发癌细胞死亡。然而，佐剂的应用由于其功效差或安全性不足而受到限制。在最近的研究中，研究人员试图开发出用于癌症免疫疗法的安全有效的佐剂，以及许多化合物（包括无机化合物，有机分子，聚合物，和胶体）已被鉴定和优化为各种途径的激动剂。在这篇综述中，我们重点研究新兴佐剂的发现和结构设计，并讨论这些发现如何使医疗保健受益。