NanoTech and Immunoengineering: How Nanotech Can Boost CAR-T Therapy

Abstract

Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) therapy has achieved remarkable clinical efficacy against hematological cancers and got FDA approval for B cells tumor. However, the complex manufacturing process and limited success in solids tumors hamper its widespread applications and provoke new strategies to overcome above-mentioned hurdles. In last decade, nanotech provides sustainable strategies to improve cancer immunotherapy for vaccine development, and in delivery of immunomodulatory drugs. Nanotech can boost the CAR-T therapy and may overcome the existing challenges by emerging as a carrier for CAR therapy, or in a joint venture it may defeat the solid tumor more effectively than the conventional approaches. However, the unraveling of cellular mechanisms, barriers, and the potential strategies that could be used to manipulate and/or educate cells would enable unprecedented advances in nanotech for biologics delivery. This review outlines the journey and barriers of nanoparticles (NPs) across the cell. Afterward, the approaches to tackle those barriers and strategies to modulate NPs as a carrier for CAR therapy are discussed. Finally, the role of NPs in CAR-T therapy and the potential challenges are summarized. The main purpose of this review is to provide the readers with a detailed overview of NPs based CAR-T therapy research, and distill this information into an accessible form conducive to design desired CAR therapy by NPs approach.