What is the status quo of CAR-T cell therapies? In the last three years, CAR-T cell therapy has stepped into the world of medicine, directly driving in the fast lane. Supported by FDA approvals, several companies started clinical trials and the outcome was amazing.
However, individualized treatments go along with high costs, a topic that needs to be covered…
In this context, I came across the publication of Morita et al. who started investigating how to optimize and enhance the expression of Anti-CD19 CARs in CAR-T cells.
Just for information, the actual costs for a one-time treatment are around $400,000. This definitely needs to be diminished in order to make CAR-T cell therapies accessible to patients in real life.
The starting point of these researchers was the use of CD19.CAR-T cells transfected with the piggyBac transposon system. This method already features reduced costs compared to viral transduction. However, in order to further shorten time lines and costs, cell cultivation must be improved to end up with the required number of functional CD19.CAR-T cells for clinical adoptive transfer.
Parameters for optimization in this publication were:
- The use of autologous activated T cells as feeder cells
- Stimulating the T cells via viral antigens instead of anti-CD3/CD28 mAb
- Using a CH2CH3-free CD19.CAR construct
Using these modifications, 51 % CAR-T positive cells were achieved with a 2,8 fold expansion after 14 days of culture. - Good approach. It’s just the beginning…of the next “Industrial” Revolution.
I hope to read more about successful optimizations of large-scale transfections, medium improvements and stimulation techniques - all applicable for clinical use of course - in the near future.
Written by Isabella
Scientific Support Specialist
