肺癌治療に向けた樹状細胞ならびにNKT細胞の誘導とアフェレシス(<特集>がん疾患とアフェレシス)

概要

論文の詳細を見る
Human Vα24 natural killer T (NKT) cells bearing an invariant Vα24Jα18 antigen receptor recognize a specific ligand, α-Galactosylceramide (αGalCer; KRN7000) in a CD1 d-dependent manner. Previous findings showed that αGalCer-pulsed dendritic cells (DCs) exerted a strong anti-tumor activity in the mouse tumor metastatic models and intravenous administration of αGalCer-pulsed DCs led to Vα14 NKT cell expansion in the lung. With these results, we performed the NKT cell-based immunotherapy for lung cancer. In this clinical research, an apheresis product was used to induce the dendritic cells or activated NKT cells. A phase I and a phase I-II clinical study of αGalCer-pulsed DC treatment in patients with lung cancer was performed. No severe adverse event related to the apheresis or treatment was observed. After the injection of αGalCer-pulsed DCs, increased numbers of IFN-γ-producing cells in the peripheral blood were detected in 10 patients. The administration of αGalCer-pulsed DCs was accompanied by the successful induction of NKT cell-dependent immune responses and the increased IFN-γ-producing cells in PBMCs might be associated with prolonged survival. These results are encouraging and warrant further evaluation of the survival benefit of this immunotherapy.
日本アフェレシス学会の論文
2009-05-31