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The challenge
The Centre of Excellence in Cellular Immunotherapy (CoE CIT) at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre is accelerating the development of CAR-T therapies and other cell-based immunotherapies for people with cancer who urgently need new treatment options, bridging the critical gap between laboratory discovery and patient care.
CAR-T cell therapy (CAR-T) has already shown strong results in certain blood cancers, particularly for patients whose disease has not responded to, or has returned after conventional treatments, such as chemotherapy or radiation. While the clinical use of CAR-T cell therapy is currently limited to the treatment of certain blood cancers in standard practice, its potential extends far beyond these indications. These expanding applications highlight the versatility of the platform and its significant potential to transform the treatment of diseases that currently have limited therapeutic options. T cells act as the body’s security guards, constantly patrolling for threats. CAR-T builds on this natural function by reprogramming a patient’s T cells to recognise and destroy cancer cells more effectively.
The CoE CIT is working to overcome key challenges in cellular immunotherapy, including improving how immune cells recognise cancer, developing new options for treatment-resistant disease, and creating more powerful targeted therapies that can overcome the cancers cells ability to shut down immunotherapies.
Who could benefit?
The Centre's work is focused on people whose cancer has returned after treatment or has never responded in the first place. For these patients, treatment options are often limited, and CAR-T offers a potential path forward when few alternatives remain.
The most immediate impact is seen in people with certain blood cancers, where cellular immunotherapy has already improved outcomes for some patients with lymphoma and multiple myeloma, as well as children and adults with leukaemia,. Researchers are working to extend these therapies to more cancers, including solid tumours, and explore their potential in autoimmune diseases through clinical trials.
“CAR-T therapies have life changing efficacy in blood cancers like leukaemia, lymphoma and myeloma. Our next big challenge is to boost this technology for patients with solid cancers that can evade immune attack.”
Professor Simon Harrison, Director, Centre of Excellence for Cellular Immunotherapy and Haematologist
The role of philanthropy
Funding from Hearts & Minds, as nominated by Munro Partners, has helped advance important work at the Centre by supporting the specialised laboratory teams conducting rigorous safety and efficacy testing of new therapies, as well as the expert staff delivering complex early-phase clinical trials.
This support has enabled a major milestone, with the first two patients now treated in a first-in-human clinical trial of a CAR-T therapy fully developed at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and manufactured on site in partnership with Cell Therapies Pty Ltd. The trial is evaluating a novel CAR-T therapy for people with CD19-positive blood cancers whose disease has stopped responding to standard treatments.
What this could unlock
This work has the potential to transform cellular immunotherapy from a highly specialised treatment into one that could benefit patients worldwide.
Over time, it could help to:
- Extend these therapies to more cancers, including solid tumours
- Improve treatments to make them safer and more effective
- Increase access so more patients can receive these therapies closer to home
- Reduce the cost and complexity of manufacturing, making cellular immunotherapy more scalable and sustainable.
This project is supported by Hearts and Minds Investments, as nominated by Core Fund Manager, Munro Partners. For further information and updates, visit Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre.
