A program hoping to supercharge a patient’s own immune system cells to attack and kill a treatment resistant form of prostate cancer was today awarded $3.99 million by the governing Board of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM)

In the U.S., prostate cancer is the second most common cause of cancer deaths in men.  An estimated 170,000 new cases are diagnosed each year and over 29,000 deaths are estimated in 2018.  Early stage prostate cancer is usually managed by surgery, radiation and/or hormone therapy. However, for men diagnosed with castrate-resistant metastatic prostate cancer (CRPC) these treatments often fail to work and the disease eventually proves fatal.

Poseida Therapeutics will be funded by CIRM to develop genetically engineered chimeric antigen receptor T cells (CAR-T) to treat metastatic CRPC. In cancer, there is a breakdown in the natural ability of immune T-cells to survey the body and recognize, bind to and kill cancerous cells. Poseida is engineering T cells and T memory stem cells to express a chimeric antigen receptor that arms these cells to more efficiently target, bind to and destroy the cancer cell. Millions of these cells are then grown in the laboratory and then re-infused into the patient. The CAR-T memory stem cells have the potential to persist long-term and kill residual cancer calls.

“This is a promising approach to an incurable disease where patients have few options,” says Maria T. Millan, M.D., President and CEO of CIRM. “The use of chimeric antigen receptor engineered T cells has led to impressive results in blood malignancies and a natural extension of this promising approach is to tackle currently untreatable solid malignancies, such as castrate resistant metastatic prostate cancer. CIRM is pleased to partner on this program and to add it to its portfolio that involves CAR T memory stem cells.”

Poseida Therapeutics plans to use the funding to complete the late-stage testing needed to apply to the Food and Drug Administration for the go-ahead to start a clinical trial in people.

Quest Awards

The CIRM Board also voted to approve investing $10 million for eight projects under its Discovery Quest Program. The Quest program promotes the discovery of promising new stem cell-based technologies that will be ready to move to the next level, the translational category, within two years, with an ultimate goal of improving patient care.

Among those approved for funding are:

• Eric Adler at UC San Diego is using genetically modified blood stem cells to treat Danon Disease, a rare and fatal condition that affects the heart
• Li Gan at the Gladstone Institutes will use induced pluripotent stem cells to develop a therapy for a familial form of dementia
• Saul Priceman at City of Hope will use CAR-T therapy to develop a treatment for recurrent ovarian cancer

Because the amount of funding for the recommended applications exceeded the money set aside, the Application Subcommittee voted to approve partial funding for two projects, DISC2-11192 and DISC2-11109 and to recommend, at the next full Board meeting in October, that the projects get the remainder of the funds needed to complete their research.

The successful applications are: