About this Research Topic
Autoimmune diseases occur when our immune system is overactive, causing it to attack and damage our body’s own tissues. The breakdown of tolerance to self-antigens leads to chronic inflammation and tissue damage, with significant health consequences for patients. There are over 100 different autoimmune diseases identified such as Systemic Lupus Erythematosus, Inflammatory Bowl Diseases, and Rheumatoid Arthritis, affecting over 24 million people in the U.S. and some could be life-threatening. Traditional treatments, focusing on whole immune system suppression, only temporarily ameliorate the symptoms, and leave the patients vulnerable to pathogens. Novel therapeutic approaches focus more on specific targeting of pathogenic pathways and re-establish homeostasis to achieve long term drug free remission and potential cure, without dampening the whole immune system. Improved understanding of the immune system and recent advances in novel modality technologies are driving the development of these next-generation therapies to achieve a cure for all autoimmune diseases.
Recent advances in technology involving novel modalities have ushered in an exciting new generation of therapeutic approaches for autoimmune diseases. These include but not limited to ex vivo CAR T therapies, in situ CAR T therapies, targeted protein degradation therapies, antibody-directed drug delivery therapies, and nucleotide-based therapies. These therapies represent an emerging trend that carries the potential to be curative without dampening the whole immune system. These are specific targeting approaches that exquisitely focused on targeting the pathogenic cells that are critical to disease progression. While the technology continues to advance quickly, we sought out the most innovative and effective novel approaches to better understand not only the novelty of these technologies, but also the development of more effective therapies for autoimmune diseases to achieve drug-free remission and eventually the cure.
Under this research topic, we aim to cover all current advancements in the field, including breakthroughs in innovative approaches as well as established technologies for the cure of autoimmune diseases. Our interests are listed below:
Advances in Cell therapies:
• Cell depletion cell therapies: CAR-T cell therapy, CAR-NK cell therapy
• Tolerance induction cell therapies: tolerogenic dendritic cells; polyclonal Tregs, engineered Tregs, e.g., TCR-Treg cells, CAR-Treg cells, polyclonal Tr1 cells.
Novel LNP-based mRNA therapies:
• In situ CAR T therapies
• In situ cell-reprogramming mRNA therapies
Cutting-edge antibody-based therapies:
• Bispecific antibodies, antibody-drug conjugates, intrabodies, proteasome-targeted nanobodies, antibody-targeted protein degraders, such as LYTAC, AbTAC, and AUTAC.
Small-molecule engager-based therapies:
• PROTAC, molecule glue, etc.
Forefront nucleic acid-based therapies:
• e.g., AAV, lentivirus, nanoparticles, mRNA, ASO, siRNA, plasmid, oligonucleotide.
Other pioneering curative treatments:
• e.g., antigen-specific tolerance induction vaccines.
Note that Ce Wang, Guobao Chen, Qi Wan and Feng Dong are AbbVie employees.
Recent advances in technology involving novel modalities have ushered in an exciting new generation of therapeutic approaches for autoimmune diseases. These include but not limited to ex vivo CAR T therapies, in situ CAR T therapies, targeted protein degradation therapies, antibody-directed drug delivery therapies, and nucleotide-based therapies. These therapies represent an emerging trend that carries the potential to be curative without dampening the whole immune system. These are specific targeting approaches that exquisitely focused on targeting the pathogenic cells that are critical to disease progression. While the technology continues to advance quickly, we sought out the most innovative and effective novel approaches to better understand not only the novelty of these technologies, but also the development of more effective therapies for autoimmune diseases to achieve drug-free remission and eventually the cure.
Under this research topic, we aim to cover all current advancements in the field, including breakthroughs in innovative approaches as well as established technologies for the cure of autoimmune diseases. Our interests are listed below:
Advances in Cell therapies:
• Cell depletion cell therapies: CAR-T cell therapy, CAR-NK cell therapy
• Tolerance induction cell therapies: tolerogenic dendritic cells; polyclonal Tregs, engineered Tregs, e.g., TCR-Treg cells, CAR-Treg cells, polyclonal Tr1 cells.
Novel LNP-based mRNA therapies:
• In situ CAR T therapies
• In situ cell-reprogramming mRNA therapies
Cutting-edge antibody-based therapies:
• Bispecific antibodies, antibody-drug conjugates, intrabodies, proteasome-targeted nanobodies, antibody-targeted protein degraders, such as LYTAC, AbTAC, and AUTAC.
Small-molecule engager-based therapies:
• PROTAC, molecule glue, etc.
Forefront nucleic acid-based therapies:
• e.g., AAV, lentivirus, nanoparticles, mRNA, ASO, siRNA, plasmid, oligonucleotide.
Other pioneering curative treatments:
• e.g., antigen-specific tolerance induction vaccines.
Note that Ce Wang, Guobao Chen, Qi Wan and Feng Dong are AbbVie employees.
Keywords: Autoimmune disease, cell therapy, gene therapy, gene editing, siRNA, protein degraders, CAR T, Regulatory T cells, nanoparticles, biologics, bispecific antibodies, ADC, PROTAC, AbTAC, LYTAC, therapeutic immunization
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