Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori Researcher Adds New Data to Research in Lymphoma (Monocytes in leukapheresis products affect the outcome of CD19-targeted CAR T-cell therapy in lymphoma patients).

A recent study conducted in Milan, Italy, has found that CD19-targeted CAR T-cell therapy can induce durable remissions in relapsed/refractory large B-cell lymphomas (R/R LBCL), but 60% of patients do not respond or relapse. The researchers performed transcriptomic and functional evaluations of leukapheresis products in 95 R/R LBCL patients and identified a signature composed of 4 myeloid genes expressed by T cells isolated from leukapheresis products that can predict patients with a very short progression-free survival. The study also found that high circulating absolute monocyte counts at the time of leukapheresis negatively influenced response and progression-free survival. This research highlights the need to incorporate monocyte depletion strategies for better CAR T production and could be used to plan trials evaluating CAR T cells versus other novel treatments or allogeneic CAR T cells. [Extracted from the article]