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New immune cell engagers for cancer immunotherapy

Nature Reviews Immunology (2024)Cite this article

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Abstract

There have been major advances in the immunotherapy of cancer in recent years, including the development of T cell engagers — antibodies engineered to redirect T cells to recognize and kill cancer cells — for the treatment of haematological malignancies. However, the field still faces several challenges to develop agents that are consistently effective in a majority of patients and cancer types, such as optimizing drug dose, overcoming treatment resistance and improving efficacy in solid tumours. A new generation of T cell-targeted molecules was developed to tackle these issues that are potentially more effective and safer. In addition, agents designed to engage the antitumour activities of other immune cells, including natural killer cells and myeloid cells, are showing promise and have the potential to treat a broader range of cancers.

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Fig. 1: Designing better T cell engagers.
Fig. 2: Mechanisms of action of natural killer cell engagers.
Fig. 3: Mechanisms of action of novel myeloid cell engagers.

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Acknowledgements

The Vivier laboratory at the Centre d’Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy and Assistance-Publique-Hôpitaux de Marseille is supported by funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, the Agence Nationale de la Recherche, including the PIONEER Project, MSDAvenir, Innate Pharma and institutional grants awarded to the Centre d’Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy and Marseille Immunopôle.

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  1. Innate Pharma Research Laboratories, Innate Pharma, Marseille, France

    Aurore Fenis, Olivier Demaria, Laurent Gauthier & Eric Vivier

  2. Aix Marseille Université, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, INSERM, Centre d’Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy, Marseille, France

    Aurore Fenis, Eric Vivier & Emilie Narni-Mancinelli

  3. Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Marseille, Hôpital de la Timone, Marseille Immunopôle, Marseille, France

    Eric Vivier

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E.N.-M. and E.V. wrote the manuscript with the help of the other authors. A.F. designed the figures. All authors contributed to the revision of the manuscript.

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Fenis, A., Demaria, O., Gauthier, L. et al. New immune cell engagers for cancer immunotherapy. Nat Rev Immunol (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41577-023-00982-7

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