CAR T cell therapy: newer approaches to counter resistance and cost

• Main Authors: Rajesh Kumar Yadav, Asgar Ali, Santosh Kumar, Alpana Sharma, Basab Baghchi, Pritanjali Singh, Sushmita Das, Chandramani Singh, Sadhana Sharma
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2020-04-01
• Series: Heliyon
• Subjects: Immunotherapy; CAR T cells; Tumor mutation burden; Epigenetics; Combination therapy; Affordable
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405844020306241

The genetically engineered Chimeric Antigen Receptor bearing T-cell (CAR T cell) therapy has been emerged as the new paradigm of cancer immunotherapy. However, recent studies have reported an increase in the number of relapsed haematological malignancies. This review provides newer insights into how the efficacy of CAR T cells might be increased by the application of new genome editing technologies, monitoring the complexity of tumor types and T cells sub-types. Next, tumor mutation burden along with tumormicroenvironment and epigenetic mechanisms of CAR T cell as well as tumor cell may play a vital role to tackle the cancer resistance mechanisms. These studies highlight the need to consider traditional cancer therapy in conjunction with CAR T cell therapy for relapsed or cases unresponsive to treatment. Of note, this therapy is highly expensive and requires multi-skill for successful implementation, which results in reduction of its accessibility/affordability to the patients. Here, we also propose a model for cost minimization of CAR T cell therapy by a collaboration of academia, hospitals and industry.