Institute Seminar Wednesday 12th of October Johanna Olweus

The immune system of a patient who has been diagnosed with cancer, has by definition failed. Cancer immunotherapy may convert the patient´s failed immune response to a clinical response by overcoming mechanisms of immune tolerance. While effective, immunotherapies that rely on the patient´s own immune system to respond represent a “shot-gun” approach, and the majority of patients are not cured. Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR)-therapies have demonstrated the power of genetically equipping T cells with immune receptors engineered with the specificities of donor-derived antibodies recognizing defined targets. Thereby a compartment of T cells with a specificity not previously present in the patient is created. A limitation of CARs is that only molecules expressed on the cell surface can be targeted. As T-cell receptors (TCRs) can recognize peptides from intracellular proteins presented on MHC, the number of potential targets can be vastly increased. Our research has focused on the possibility to utilize donor-derived T-cell receptors for immunotherapy. We have followed two main strategies i) TCRs recognizing cell-type specific peptides common for large patient groups in the context of mismatched HLA, and ii) TCRs recognizing mutated peptides (neo-antigens) in the context of matched HLA. The results show that the “outsourcing” of immune responses to T cells expressing such donor-derived TCRs can be highly effective at targeting of malignant cells.

Links:

Home page of the Johanna Olweus research group "Immunotherapy and Antigen presentation"

Department of Immunology

Institute seminars, autumn 2016