There has been significant progress made in the understanding of T cell recognition of human tumor antigens, however the properties that enable T cells to mediate clinical cancer regression remain unclear. We hypothesized that an iterative translational strategy involving isolation and clinical adoptive transfer of sequential populations of well characterized melanoma specific T cell clones could help systematically define the specific antigenic targets and lymphocyte characteristics associated with T cell persistence, therapeutic efficacy, and toxicity. To overcome the significant obstacle in isolating multiple clonal variants for use in cancer therapy, we recently described a novel T cell isolation platform to rapidly obtain antigen specific T cell clones under GMP standards from the peripheral blood of patients. The methodology utilizes high throughput cytokine gene expression profiling to identify rare antigen specific T cells within heterogeneous cell populations. The technology is the subject of U.S. Patent Application (12/866,919) and was evaluated by the NCI Technology Advisory Group in 2011 and voted as one of NCIs top intramural inventions with respect to significance, innovation, and commercial potential (http://sbir.cancer.gov/funding/contracts/311.asp).This work has also resulted in a federal technology transfer award in 2011 (Recipient: Kammula). The versatility of the rapid cloning technology has allowed us to isolate a variety of CD8+ T cell clones that have specificity for common tumor antigens including gp100, MART, tyrosinase, NY-ESO, MAGE, and mesothelin. Further molecular characterization of these cells revealed that the stoichiometric production of IL-2 and IFN-g mRNA by these CD8+ T cells could further define a highly proliferative central memory (TCM) population. In the initial iteration of our research strategy, we translated these novel in vitro findings to a first-in-human clinical trial in which we adoptively transferred gp100 specific effector clones derived from TCM parental cells to patients with metastatic melanoma (NCI 08-C-0104). Analysis of this trial has revealed that these clones were able to target skin melanocytes in an autoimmune fashion, persist long term, and reacquire TCM attributes after transfer. This represents the first evidence in humans that TCM-derived effector clones can exert potent antigen specific effector function and also undergo self renewal to repopulate the memory pool after adoptive transfer. These findings have direct implications on the selection of T cells for future adoptive immunotherapy efforts and a manuscript is currently in revision for Science Translational Medicine. The methodology for isolation of tumor specific central memory cells is the subject of a second U.S. Patent Application (PCT/US2011/47719).

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Cancer Institute (NCI)
Type
Investigator-Initiated Intramural Research Projects (ZIA)
Project #
1ZIABC010766-08
Application #
8937829
Study Section
Project Start
Project End
Budget Start
Budget End
Support Year
8
Fiscal Year
2014
Total Cost
Indirect Cost
Name
Basic Sciences
Department
Type
DUNS #
City
State
Country
Zip Code
Chandran, Smita S; Somerville, Robert P T; Yang, James C et al. (2017) Treatment of metastatic uveal melanoma with adoptive transfer of tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes: a single-centre, two-stage, single-arm, phase 2 study. Lancet Oncol 18:792-802
Rothermel, Luke D; Sabesan, Arvind C; Stephens, Daniel J et al. (2016) Identification of an Immunogenic Subset of Metastatic Uveal Melanoma. Clin Cancer Res 22:2237-49
Chandran, Smita S; Paria, Biman C; Srivastava, Abhishek K et al. (2015) Persistence of CTL clones targeting melanocyte differentiation antigens was insufficient to mediate significant melanoma regression in humans. Clin Cancer Res 21:534-43
Chandran, Smita S; Paria, Biman C; Srivastava, Abhishek K et al. (2015) Tumor-Specific Effector CD8+ T Cells That Can Establish Immunological Memory in Humans after Adoptive Transfer Are Marked by Expression of IL7 Receptor and c-myc. Cancer Res 75:3216-26
Bartlett, Edmund K; Fetsch, Patricia A; Filie, Armando C et al. (2014) Human melanoma metastases demonstrate nonstochastic site-specific antigen heterogeneity that correlates with T-cell infiltration. Clin Cancer Res 20:2607-2616
Wang, Anran; Chandran, Smita; Shah, Syed A et al. (2012) The stoichiometric production of IL-2 and IFN-? mRNA defines memory T cells that can self-renew after adoptive transfer in humans. Sci Transl Med 4:149ra120