2016 AAAS Annual Meeting (February 11-15, 2016)

February 10 - 15, 2016

Fighting Cancer and Chronic Infections with T Cell Therapy: Promise and Progress

T cell immunity has evolved to recognize and respond to health threats and provide a lifelong memory that prevents recurrent disease. However, with chronic diseases, T cells often become inactive. Recent advances have brought the idea of fighting chronic infections, and even cancers, by restoring protective T cell responses much closer to reality for mainstream clinical practice. This session focuses mainly on a promising approach known as adoptive T cell therapy, in which a patient receives "killer" immune cells that target a disease agent. However, several obstacles to widespread clinical use must be addressed: identifying or generating T cells that will be most effective for each individual case, whether from the patient or from a suitable donor; avoiding or countering potential side-effects; and finding ways to shorten the path from bench to bedside. This symposium reports on progress on all three fronts. This discussion covers the current status of clinical trials; the importance of distinct T cell subsets with stem cell-like characteristics for achieving durable responses; gene therapy for providing effective antigen-receptors and minimizing side-effects; and innovations in clinical cell processing and purification that could, among other things, open the way for faster regulatory approvals.