尽管医学生物学和分子生物学领域的新工具和技术取得了显着进步，但大多数癌症类型的治疗挑战仍然存在，即产生耐药性的问题，并且癌症患者的总体生存率没有实质性提高。与传统化疗和放疗相比，免疫疗法在治疗各种癌症的不同临床和临床前试验中显示出最有希望的结果，因为它对许多癌症患者具有更高的疗效和最小的附带损害。溶瘤病毒是一类新型免疫疗法，可以选择性地在肿瘤细胞中复制并通过细胞裂解过程破坏肿瘤细胞，同时对正常细胞影响最小或没有影响。除此之外，它还可以激活宿主的先天免疫系统，产生抗肿瘤免疫反应，消灭肿瘤细胞。几种野生型和转基因病毒已被研究显示出溶瘤行为。痘苗病毒已被广泛研究，并在各种模型系统和临床试验中测试了其有希望的溶瘤性质。最近，已经开发出几种工程痘苗病毒，它们表达选择性渗透肿瘤细胞所需的基因，并增强免疫系统的激活以产生抗肿瘤免疫力。然而，还需要进一步研究来证明其潜力并增强其治疗功效。© 2024。作者，获得 Springer Nature Switzerland AG 的独家许可。

Despite the significant advancement of new tools and technology in the field of medical biology and molecular biology, the challenges in the treatment of most cancer types remain constant with the problem of developing resistance toward drugs and no substantial enhancement in the overall survival rate of cancer patients. Immunotherapy has shown the most promising results in different clinical and preclinical trials in the treatment of various cancer due to its higher efficacy and minimum collateral damage in many cancer patients as compared to conventional chemotherapy and radiotherapy. An oncolytic virus is a new class of immunotherapy that can selectively replicate in tumor cells and destroy them by the process of cell lysis while exerting minimum or no effect on a normal cell. Besides this, it can also activate the host's innate immune system, which generates an anti-tumor immune response to eliminate the tumor cells. Several wild types and genetically modified viruses have been investigated to show oncolytic behavior. Vaccinia virus has been studied extensively and tested for its promising oncolytic nature on various model systems and clinical trials. Recently, several engineered vaccinia viruses have been developed that express the desired genes encoded for selective penetration in tumor cells and enhanced activation of the immune system for generating anti-tumor immunity. However, further investigation is required to prove their potential and enhance their therapeutic efficacy.© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.