History and perspectives of chimeric antigen receptor-T cell therapy

Abstract

Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cell therapy is a cell-based cancer immunotherapy that utilizes autologous T-lymphocytes genetically modified with the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) gene. CD19-targeted CAR-T cell therapy (tisagenlecleucel) has shown dramatic treatment results in patients with relapsed and refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia, and was approved in the US in 2017 as well as in Japan in 2019. In this article, I review the history of CAR development, from the initial developmental stage to clinical success. In addition, I describe differences in the results of CAR-T cell therapy using different costimulatory signals and a brief history of CAR-NK cell therapy.