Publications by authors named "M Brugman"

Article Synopsis
  • Regulators and industry experts are looking for better ways to assess the cancer-causing potential of gene therapies, as current methods may not be sufficient.
  • A meeting in London in March 2023 brought together specialists to reach a consensus on key themes such as vector genotoxicity, uncertainty sources, and appropriate toxicological endpoints for gene therapy evaluation.
  • The recommendations from this meeting aim to guide the creation of new regulatory guidelines for the nonclinical toxicological assessment of gene therapy products.
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The antitumor activity of adoptive T cell therapies (ACT) is highly dependent on the expansion, persistence, and continued activity of adoptively transferred cells. Clinical studies using ACTs have revealed that products that possess and maintain less differentiated phenotypes, including memory and precursor T cells, show increased antitumor efficacy and superior patient outcomes owing to their increased expansion, persistence, and ability to differentiate into effector progeny that elicit antitumor responses. Strategies that drive the differentiation into memory or precursor-type T cell subsets with high potential for persistence and self-renewal will enhance adoptively transferred T cell maintenance and promote durable antitumor efficacy.

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Genetic modification of cells using viral vectors has shown huge therapeutic benefit in multiple diseases. However, inefficient transduction contributes to the high cost of these therapies. Several transduction-enhancing small molecules have previously been identified; however, some may be toxic to the cells or patient, otherwise alter cellular characteristics, or further increase manufacturing complexity.

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Retroviral insertional mutagenesis (RIM) is both a relevant risk in gene therapy and a powerful tool for identifying genes that enhance the competitiveness of repopulating hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs). However, focusing only on the gene closest to the retroviral vector insertion site (RVIS) may underestimate the effects of RIM, as dysregulation of distal and/or multiple genes by a single insertion event was reported in several studies. As a proof of concept, we examined the common insertion site (CIS) , which revealed seven genes located within ±150 kb from the RVIS for our study.

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