About this Research Topic
This issue of Frontiers in Immunology provides a comprehensive update on the evolving technology, targets, and mechanisms of CAR-T cell therapies. While CAR-T has demonstrated success in various blood cancers, challenges persist, including antigen escape, relapse, cytokine release syndrome (CRS), on-target tumor toxicity, and neurotoxicity. Addressing these challenges, recent reports highlight innovative solutions such as dual-target CAR, SynNotch CAR, and iCAR.
For solid tumors, CAR-T's success has been limited, attributed to factors such as recruitment and infiltration efficacy, tumor cell heterogeneity, the suppressive tumor microenvironment, and T cell exhaustion. Ongoing efforts focus on novel approaches, including multiple-target CAR, chemokine receptor-expressing CAR, and antibody-secreting CAR. In the realm of autoimmunity, advancements like anti-DSG3 CAR and anti-Musk CAR have surfaced, with promising clinical benefits observed in anti-CD19 CAR research, indicating a promising future direction.
Research on other immunotherapies is underway, with investigations into suitable targets gaining momentum. Moreover, the field is actively exploring methods of CAR construct delivery to cells, emphasizing non-viral and specific genome insertion approaches.
This Research Topic invites submissions encompassing a range of sub-topics, including but not limited to:
- Enhancing in vivo persistence and efficacy of CAR-T
- Mitigating on-target off-tumor toxicity of CAR-T.
- Resolving tumor heterogeneity and the suppressive tumor microenvironment.
- Advancements in delivering CAR constructs in vitro and in vivo.
- Exploring new targets for indications beyond cancer.
We enthusiastically welcome Original Research and Review articles that focus on clinical data, address unmet medical needs, and introduce novel mechanisms in the dynamic field of CAR-T cell therapies. Your contributions will contribute significantly to advancing our understanding and applications in this cutting-edge domain.
Keywords: CAR-T, cancer, solid tumor, autoimmune diseases, new technologies, new targets, clinical data
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.