Few cancers arising in fluid organ systems can be cured with localized therapeutic modalities, such as radiation or surgical organ removal. Chemotherapy and hematopoietic stem cell transplants have long been employed as the standard of care for patients diagnosed with leukemias and lymphomas. Though research continues to propose new, more potent chemotherapeutic agents, a new paradigm of treating cancerous malignancies with tumor-specific monoclonal antibodies, adoptively transferred tumor-fighting cells, and other exogenously administered immunomodulatory agents, has emerged over the past decade. These immunotherapies have dramatically improved the outcomes of patients diagnosed with cancers of B lymphocytes, referred to as B-cell malignancies.
Though curative FDA-approved therapies for patients diagnosed with B-cell malignancies have yet to be established, recent research in the field of adoptive T-cell therapy has produced promising results. Tumor infiltrating lymphocyte therapy (TIL therapy), T-cell Receptor Therapy (TCR therapy) and Chimeric Antigen Receptor T-cell Therapy (CAR T-cell therapy) are the three most extensively studied adoptive T-cell immunotherapies in the context of B-cell malignancies. TIL and TCR therapies, in which patients are provided with either the patient’s own tumor-specific T-cells or T-cells expressing engineered, tumor-specific TCRs, respectively, enhance the patient’s immune system to mount a more potent, anti-tumor response. However, these adoptive T-cell therapies do not change the mechanisms of the immune response.
Cancerous cells can evade immune attack and dampen immune responses to survive and thrive in the body. By down-regulating their expression of human major histocompatibility complex I (MHC I), for example, cancer cells escape T-cell recognition, which is dependent on MHC expression. A chimeric antigen receptor (CAR), is composed of an antibody-derived (B-cell derived) extracellular, antigen-recognition domain, and T-cell derived intracellular domains. CAR T-cells, therefore, exploit the cytotoxic nature of CD8+ T-cells, and the MHC independent recognition of B-cell receptors, to identify and destroy all cells expressing a specific target. Consequently, many of the cancer cell’s mechanisms of immune evasion are less effective in the presence of CAR T-cells. Progressive generations of CAR T-cell designs couple these receptors with costimulatory molecules to amplify the activation, efficacy, and potency of these cells in-vivo.
Over the past five years, phase I and IIa clinical trials have produced remarkable results in the treatment of advanced stage, high-risk B-cell malignancies, namely Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL), Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL), and Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (NHL). However, the significant oncogenic risks and fatal adverse events associated with this therapy necessitate further research to improve safety and reliable clinical efficacy of CAR T-cell therapy. In spite of these risks, the adoptive transfer of CD19-targeting, CAR expressing, cytotoxic T-cells (anti-CD19 CAR-T-cells) has produced sustained, complete remissions in patients diagnosed with progressive, advanced-stage, B-cell malignancies, for whom alternative treatments were not available. The unprecedented results of early clinical trials, as well as ongoing preclinical studies aimed at improving the design and production of CAR T-cells suggest a promising future for CAR T-cell therapy as a cure for B-cell malignancies.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bu.edu/oai:open.bu.edu:2144/23818 |
| Date | 13 July 2017 |
| Creators | Koduri, Megha Pallavi |
| Source Sets | Boston University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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