All-trans retinoic acid and interferon-α increase CD38 expression on adult T-cell leukemia cells and sensitize them to T cells bearing anti-CD38 chimeric antigen receptors

摘要

Survival of patients with adult T-cell leukemia (ATL), which is caused by human T-cell lymphotropic virus type-1 (HTLV-1), has been improved by the introduction of anti-CCR4 monoclonal antibody and allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. However, not all patients benefit from these modalities, necessitating a novel therapeutic strategy. 1 , 2 Recently, an adoptive T-cell immunotherapy with chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) is clinically promising for patients with refractory blood diseases. 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 Thus, CD38 is an attractive target of CAR therapy for lymphoid neoplasms because it is widely expressed on cells of B- and T-lymphoid malignancies.