Strategies to accelerate immune recovery after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation

Barbarella Lucarelli, Pietro Merli, Valentina Bertaina, Franco Locatelli

Research output: Contribution to journalArticle

Abstract

The interplay existing between immune reconstitution and patient outcome has been extensively demonstrated in allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. One of the leading causes of infection-related mortality is the slow recovery of T-cell immunity due to the conditioning regimen and/or age-related thymus damage, poor naïve T-cell output, and restricted T-cell receptor (TCR) repertoires. With the aim of improving posttransplantation immune reconstitution, several immunotherapy approaches have been explored. Donor leukocyte infusions are widely used to accelerate immune recovery, but they carry the risk of provoking graft-versus-host disease. This review will focus on sophisticated strategies of thymus function-recovery, adoptive infusion of donor-derived, allodepleted T cells, T-cell lines/clones specific for life-threatening pathogens, regulatory T cells, and of T cells transduced with suicide genes.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)343-358
Number of pages16
JournalExpert Review of Clinical Immunology
Volume12
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2016

Keywords

  • donor leukocyte infusion
  • hematopoietic stem cell transplantation
  • thymus function
  • T-cell immunotherapy
  • Immune reconstitution

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