Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Monash University, 381 Royal Parade, Parkville, VIC, 3052, Australia.
Melbourne Centre for Nanofabrication, Victorian Node of the Australian National Fabrication Facility, 151 Wellington Road, Clayton, VIC, 3168, Australia.
Adv Mater. 2023 Nov;35(44):e2304122. doi: 10.1002/adma.202304122. Epub 2023 Sep 13.
Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cell therapy has emerged as a promising cell-based immunotherapy approach for treating blood disorders and cancers, but genetically engineering CAR-T cells is challenging due to primary T cells' sensitivity to conventional gene delivery approaches. The current viral-based method can typically involve significant operating costs and biosafety hurdles, while bulk electroporation (BEP) can lead to poor cell viability and functionality. Here, a non-viral electroactive nanoinjection (ENI) platform is developed to efficiently negotiate the plasma membrane of primary human T cells via vertically configured electroactive nanotubes, enabling efficient delivery (68.7%) and expression (43.3%) of CAR genes in the T cells, with minimal cellular perturbation (>90% cell viability). Compared to conventional BEP, the ENI platform achieves an almost threefold higher CAR transfection efficiency, indicated by the significantly higher reporter GFP expression (43.3% compared to 16.3%). By co-culturing with target lymphoma Raji cells, the ENI-transfected CAR-T cells' ability to effectively suppress lymphoma cell growth (86.9% cytotoxicity) is proved. Taken together, the results demonstrate the platform's remarkable capacity to generate functional and effective anti-lymphoma CAR-T cells. Given the growing potential of cell-based immunotherapies, such a platform holds great promise for ex vivo cell engineering, especially in CAR-T cell therapy.
嵌合抗原受体 (CAR)-T 细胞疗法已成为治疗血液疾病和癌症的一种很有前途的细胞免疫疗法,但由于原代 T 细胞对传统基因传递方法的敏感性,对 CAR-T 细胞进行基因工程改造具有挑战性。目前的病毒方法通常涉及高昂的运营成本和生物安全障碍,而批量电穿孔 (BEP) 可能导致细胞活力和功能不佳。在这里,开发了一种非病毒电活性纳米注射 (ENI) 平台,通过垂直配置的电活性纳米管有效地穿透原代人 T 细胞的质膜,从而实现 CAR 基因在 T 细胞中的高效传递 (68.7%) 和表达 (43.3%),细胞干扰最小 (>90%的细胞活力)。与传统的 BEP 相比,ENI 平台实现了近三倍的更高的 CAR 转染效率,通过显著更高的报告 GFP 表达 (43.3% 比 16.3%) 来指示。通过与靶淋巴瘤 Raji 细胞共培养,证明了 ENI 转染的 CAR-T 细胞有效抑制淋巴瘤细胞生长的能力 (86.9%的细胞毒性)。总之,这些结果表明该平台具有产生功能性和有效抗淋巴瘤 CAR-T 细胞的卓越能力。鉴于细胞免疫疗法的潜力不断增加,这样的平台对于体外细胞工程具有很大的前景,特别是在 CAR-T 细胞疗法中。