Current Status and Progress of CAR-T Cell Therapy in the Treatment of Small Cell Lung Cancer

Abstract

Small cell lung cancer (SCLC), which takes possession of about 15% of lung cancers, is closely related to smoking and is more common in older men. It has a high degree of malignancy, rapid growth, early metastasis, low survival rate in five years, and unfavorable prognosis. Current treatments include targeted therapy, chemotherapy and immunotherapy, etc. Among them, immunotherapy has grown in popularity as a new technique these years for treating tumors in the overall setting of SCLC. The chimeric antigen receptor (CAR-T) cell therapy, which has already showed considerable success curing hematological malignancies, has attracted the attention of many scientists. According to the current experimental studies, CD56, DLL3, GD2, CD133/AC133, CDH17 and other CAR-T cell targets have been found. AMG 119, a DLL3-targeted CAR T-cell therapy, has successfully completed phase I clinical trial and demonstrated good efficacy. Because of the limiting factors of CAR-T such as antigen escape, cancer infiltration, CAR-T cell trafficking, immunosuppressive microenvironment and on-target, off-tumor effects, etc. Further research and exploration are still needed in the field of solid tumor application. In order to effectively treat SCLC, there was still a huge progress to be made for CAR-T cell therapy compared to conventional therapy approaches. Further basic research and clinical studies are required.