Engineering human pluripotent stem cells for enhanced lymphocyte development and function

Abstract

Human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) provide accessible, genetically tractable and homogenous starting cell populations to efficiently study human blood cell development. These cell populations provide platforms to develop new cell-based therapies to treat both malignant and non-malignant hematological diseases. Our group has previously demonstrated the ability of hESC-derived hematopoietic precursors to produce functional natural killer (NK) cells. hESCs and iPSCs, which can be reliably engineered in vitro, provide an important model system to study human lymphocyte development and produce enhanced cell-based therapies with potential to serve as a "universal" source of anti-tumor lymphocytes for novel clinical therapies. My studies have focused on the generation of NK cells from hESCs and iPSCs, their function both in vitro and in vivo against a variety of different tumor types, and modification of these cells with genetic constructs to enhance their anti-tumor capabilities.