A chimeric antigen receptor uniquely recognizing MICA/B stress proteins provides an effective approach to target solid tumors

Background: The advent of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapies has transformed the treatment of hematological malignancies; however, broader therapeutic success of CAR T cells has been limited in solid tumors because of their frequently heterogeneous composition. Stress proteins in the MICA and MICB (MICA/B) family are broadly expressed by tumor cells following DNA damage but are rapidly shed to evade immune detection.

Methods: We have developed a novel CAR targeting the conserved α3 domain of MICA/B (3MICA/B CAR) and incorporated it into a multiplexed-engineered induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived natural killer (NK) cell (3MICA/B CAR iNK) that expressed a shedding-resistant form of the CD16 Fc receptor to enable tumor recognition through two major targeting receptors.

Findings: We demonstrated that 3MICA/B CAR mitigates MICA/B shedding and inhibition via soluble MICA/B while simultaneously exhibiting antigen-specific anti-tumor reactivity across an expansive library of human cancer cell lines. Pre-clinical assessment of 3MICA/B CAR iNK cells demonstrated potent antigen-specific in vivo cytolytic activity against both solid and hematological xenograft models, which was further enhanced in combination with tumor-targeted therapeutic antibodies that activate the CD16 Fc receptor.

Conclusions: Our work demonstrated 3MICA/B CAR iNK cells to be a promising multi-antigen-targeting cancer immunotherapy approach intended for solid tumors.

Funding: Funded by Fate Therapeutics and NIH (R01CA238039).