CD7 CAR: sword and shield

In this issue of Blood, Lu et al(1) describe a novel approach for generating autologous CD7-specific chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells from peripheral blood T cells that can naturally overcome CD7-directed fratricide; these T cells could be useful for treating patients with T-lineage malignancies. Expression of a CD7 CAR in T cells promotes sequestration of the available CD7 antigen, resulting in an expansion of naturally selected fratricide-resistant CD7 CAR T cells. The authors report that these CD7 CAR T cells were well tolerated in 20 patients with relapsed or refractory T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL) or T-cell acute lymphoblastic lymphoma (T-LBL) and induced complete remission (CR) in most of them.

Automated summary

The article introduces a novel approach to generate autologous CD7-specific CAR T cells for treating patients with T-lineage malignancies. The research shows that this method has shown good efficacy in patients.