Accelerating Development and Improving Access to CAR and TCR-engineered T cell therapy

ongoing

Immune cells that are empowered by gene-engineering to seek and destroy cancer cells (engineered T cell therapy) constitute a transformative novel treatment that has the potential to cure cancer. Multiple new versions of this therapy are being developed for distinct types of cancer but their introduction into clinical practice is hampered by a lack of standardized and validated models to predict safety and efficacy, customized manufacturing and monitoring to scale up production and clinical use to industry standard, and strategies for optimal patient conditioning. The T2EVOLVE consortium unites scientists and physicians, regulators and policy makers, SMEs, and patient stakeholders to tackle these challenges in an orchestrated multi-disciplinary multi-stakeholder approach. A core feature of this approach will be the embedding of patient stakeholders as contributing members of the team across all levels of the R&D process. The overall aim is the development of an innovation ecosystem that will accelerate the process of developing engineered T cell therapy in the EU. The project will deliver novel tools for education and for improving the communication between healthcare providers and patients, optimized laboratory models that can help determine how safe and effective new therapies with engineered T cells are, standardized methods in which these therapies are produced and monitored during treatment. The consortium members are innovators and pioneers in this field that are dedicated to bringing the EU to the forefront of the global engineered T cell therapy movement. This effort will ensure that EU citizens will continue to have access to the most innovative and best-available medical care, provide guidance on how to implement this novel treatment into the EU health care system in a sustainable way, and secure a leading role for Europe in this emerging field in medicine and science, the economy and society.