Epitope editing of immunotherapies; plus NovoBiotic’s antibiotic and more

Two separate teams used epitope base editing to create CAR T cell immunotherapies against essential genes with decreased on-target/off-tumor toxicities.

One group, led by Carl June and Saar Gill at University of Pennsylvania, used base editing to install a mutation in PTPRC on healthy hematopoietic stem cells and on CAR T cells. The mutation preserved the function of PTPRC, permitting the cells to engraft, persist and differentiate, while allowing them to evade anti-PTPRC CAR T cell recognition. Epitope edited anti-PTPRC CAR T cells were fratricide-resistant and effective against patient-derived acute myelogenous leukemia, B cell lymphoma and acute T cell leukemia. The article was published in Science Translational Medicine...