Identification of AKAP-4 as a new cancer/testis antigen for detection and immunotherapy of prostate cancer.

Prostate cancer (PC) is the second most common cancer in older men， after skin cancer. PC is difficult to diagnose because the prostate-specific antigen screening method is associated with many false positives. In addition there is a need to develop new and more effective treatments. Among presently available new treatments， immunotherapy is a promising approach. We investigated the expression of the cancer/testis antigen， AKAP-4， in PC patients to evaluate the possibility of exploiting AKAP-4 as a target for immunotherapy.