After CAR T-cell immunotherapy for leukemia, some children have a longer remission because the engineered cells remain active and control or prevent the growth of new tumor cells. A new collaborative study has found that these persistent cells expressed certain genes that could be identified through a transcriptional signature. The finding could explain why the treatment does not work in some patients, and potentially help to improve it, reducing relapses.
Maxcyte Inc. and Vittoria Biotherapeutics Inc. have signed a strategic platform license agreement for use of Maxcyte’s Flow Electroporation technology and Expert platform by Vittoria Biotherapeutics. Under the agreement, Vittoria will obtain nonexclusive clinical and commercial rights to use Maxcyte’s Flow Electroporation technology and Expert platform, and will pay Maxcyte platform licensing fees and program-related revenue.
Poseida Therapeutics Inc. has received FDA clearance of its IND application for P-CD19CD20-ALLO1, an allogeneic dual chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell product candidate being developed for relapsed or refractory B-cell malignancies in partnership with F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. The company is actively focused on opening clinical sites for a phase I study in adults with relapsed or refractory B-cell malignancies.
Coimmune Inc. has obtained a license to target delta-like ligand 3 (DLL3) with IL-18 armored chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) technology. The company exercised an option to obtain an exclusive license in the DLL3-targeted, allogeneic CAR-cytokine induced killer (CAR-CIK) cell therapy field to IL-18 armored CAR technology under an agreement with Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK).
Panbela Therapeutics Inc. has entered into a sponsored research agreement with The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center for the evaluation of polyamine metabolic inhibitor...
Part of the reason for CAR T cells’ astonishing success in B-cell cancers is that B cells are astonishingly easy to replace. CAR T cells are specific, yes. But they are not specific to tumor cells. They are specific to their target antigens. In the case of Yescarta (axicabtagene ciloleucel, Gilead Sciences Inc.) and Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel, Novartis AG), the first two clinically approved T cells, that target is CD19, which is expressed on B-cell precursors. And when it is successful, the treatment leaves patients without any B cells at all.
Diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) is an almost universally fatal brain pediatric tumor and the only tumor indication where palliative radiotherapy is the current standard of care. Although chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy may hold promise for treating DIPG, the elevated tumor heterogeneity and the prospect of antigen escape make the identification of additional targets crucial. Therefore, multiple targets need to be validated to facilitate a multipronged approach.
A new study has discovered a promising approach to improve the efficacy of adoptive cell therapies for cancer. The research, published in Molecular Therapy: Nucleic Acids, describes the development of novel Fas-TNFR chimeras acting as decoys for the Fas ligand and preventing it from binding to its natural receptor on the surface of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells.
Type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) is an autoimmune disease in which the person’s immune system destroys its own pancreatic islet cells that leads to complete loss of insulin production. Allogeneic pancreatic islet cell transplantation has been shown to replenish the vanished β-cell population and provide glycemic control, restoration of hypoglycemia awareness, and protection from severe hypoglycemic events. However, with allogeneic transplantation, there is a need for life-long immunosuppression to protect the islet grafts from allo- and autoimmunity.
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