T cell receptor gene therapy targeting WT1 prevents acute myeloid leukemia relapse post-transplant
Aude G Chapuis, Daniel N Egan, Merav Bar, Thomas M Schmitt, Megan S McAfee, Kelly G Paulson, Valentin Voillet, Raphael Gottardo, Gunnar B Ragnarsson, Marie Bleakley, Cecilia C Yeung, Petri Muhlhauser, Hieu N Nguyen, Lara A Kropp, Luca Castelli, Felecia Wagener, Daniel Hunter, Marcus Lindberg, Kristen Cohen, Aaron Seese, M Juliana McElrath, Natalie Duerkopp, Ted A Gooley, Philip D Greenberg, Aude G Chapuis, Daniel N Egan, Merav Bar, Thomas M Schmitt, Megan S McAfee, Kelly G Paulson, Valentin Voillet, Raphael Gottardo, Gunnar B Ragnarsson, Marie Bleakley, Cecilia C Yeung, Petri Muhlhauser, Hieu N Nguyen, Lara A Kropp, Luca Castelli, Felecia Wagener, Daniel Hunter, Marcus Lindberg, Kristen Cohen, Aaron Seese, M Juliana McElrath, Natalie Duerkopp, Ted A Gooley, Philip D Greenberg
Abstract
Relapse after allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) is the leading cause of death in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) entering HCT with poor-risk features1-3. When HCT does produce prolonged relapse-free survival, it commonly reflects graft-versus-leukemia effects mediated by donor T cells reactive with antigens on leukemic cells4. As graft T cells have not been selected for leukemia specificity and frequently recognize proteins expressed by many normal host tissues, graft-versus-leukemia effects are often accompanied by morbidity and mortality from graft-versus-host disease5. Thus, AML relapse risk might be more effectively reduced with T cells expressing receptors (TCRs) that target selected AML antigens6. We therefore isolated a high-affinity Wilms' Tumor Antigen 1-specific TCR (TCRC4) from HLA-A2+ normal donor repertoires, inserted TCRC4 into Epstein-Bar virus-specific donor CD8+ T cells (TTCR-C4) to minimize graft-versus-host disease risk and enhance transferred T cell survival7,8, and infused these cells prophylactically post-HCT into 12 patients ( NCT01640301 ). Relapse-free survival was 100% at a median of 44 months following infusion, while a concurrent comparative group of 88 patients with similar risk AML had 54% relapse-free survival (P = 0.002). TTCR-C4 maintained TCRC4 expression, persisted long-term and were polyfunctional. This strategy appears promising for preventing AML recurrence in individuals at increased risk of post-HCT relapse.
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![Figure 1:. Phenotypic and functional characteristics of…](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/instance/6982533/bin/nihms-1055193-f0001.jpg)
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![Figure 3.. Phenotypic, functional characteristics and transcriptome…](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/instance/6982533/bin/nihms-1055193-f0003.jpg)
Source: PubMed