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Gene Therapy Progress and Prospects: Gene therapy in organ transplantation

Gene Therapy volume 10, pages 605–611 (2003)Cite this article

Abstract

One major complication facing organ transplant recipients is the requirement for life-long systemic immunosuppression to prevent rejection, which is associated with an increased incidence of malignancy and susceptibility to opportunistic infections. Gene therapy has the potential to eliminate problems associated with immunosuppression by allowing the production of immunomodulatory proteins in the donor grafts resulting in local rather than systemic immunosuppression. Alternatively, gene therapy approaches could eliminate the requirement for general immunosuppression by allowing the induction of donor-specific tolerance. Gene therapy interventions may also be able to prevent graft damage owing to nonimmune-mediated graft loss or injury and prevent chronic rejection. This review will focus on recent progress in preventing transplant rejection by gene therapy.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Drs David KC Cooper and Yong Guang Yang for critical review of the manuscript, and members of the Iacomini Laboratory for helpful suggestions and comments. This work was upported by NIH grants RO1 AI43619 and RO1 AI44268 to JI. JB is supported by NIH Training grant T32 AI07529, and in part by a grant from the Children's A-T Project.

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  1. Transplantation Biology Research Center, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, MGH-East, Boston, 02129, MA, USA

    J Bagley & J Iacomini

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Bagley, J., Iacomini, J. Gene Therapy Progress and Prospects: Gene therapy in organ transplantation. Gene Ther 10, 605–611 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.gt.3302020

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