Current Methodology Advances in Cell Therapy Applications—2nd Edition

Dear Colleagues,

Cell Therapy per definition involves injecting or transplanting cellular material into a patient with the aim of treating a disease. Cell Therapy approaches are naturally diverse, using both autologous (i.e., patient self-derived) material or allogeneic cells (derived from either genetically matched donors or from engineered stem cells). One prominent and well-studied example of a Cell Therapy application is autologous CAR T therapy, where patient T cells are genetically engineered to express specific tumor-targeting chimeric antigen receptors. CAR T therapies have proven to be efficient treatments for a variety of hematologic cancers. Alternatively, stem-cell-derived allogeneic therapies use genetically engineered human stem cells or human-induced pluripotent stem cells that will later be differentiated into the desired effector cells, ensuring a much wider target range. Such allogeneic therapy will provide almost unlimited material and can be applied to a larger number of patients. Cell-based therapies are a rapidly developing field with high medical interest. Cutting edge techniques are used for Cell Therapy development and are constantly optimized across several fields: generation of appropriate cell sources, genetic engineering of donor cells, differentiation protocols for stem-cell-based products and aspects of safety studies, and rigorous quality assurance procedures for Cell Therapy products.

Owing to the success of the first volume, we are developing a second. This Special Issue of Methods and Protocols will continue to bridge all efforts in this field and to collect even more advances in methods, procedures, and protocols for all areas of Cell Therapy applications. We are very much looking forward to receiving your invaluable contributions.

Dr. Kejin Hu
Dr. Lucia Monaco
Dr. Philip Hublitz
Guest Editors

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• cell therapy
• autologous
• allogeneic
• stem-cell-based therapies
• T cell engineering
• immuno-oncology
• tissue repair