There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.
Abstract
Over the last two decades, harnessing the power of the immune system has shown substantial
promise. Specifically, the successes that chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells
achieved in the treatment of hematologic malignancies provided a concrete platform
for further development in solid tumors. Considering that the latter contribute more
than three quarters of cancer-related deaths in humans makes it clear that solid tumors
represent the larger medical challenge, but also the larger developmental promise
in the market. In solid tumors though, the more is achieved the more challenges are
unveiled. The mere fact that engineered T cells are personalized therapies rather
than a mass product has been a main constraint for clinical outspread. Further, the
complexity of the hostile solid tumor microenvironment, antigenic diversity and dynamicity
and the presence of a tenacious stem cell population rendered the effective development
to the clinic questionable. In this article we shed light on the importance of a realistic
understanding of challenges faced in solid tumors and some very innovative efforts
to overcome these challenges in a manner that paves a pragmatic yet realistic road
toward effective development at the discovery level and beyond.