On November 8, 2019 Bellicum Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:BLCM), a leader in developing novel, controllable cellular immunotherapies for cancers, reported a poster showing preclinical data from its natural killer (NK) cell chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) program at the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) (Free SITC Whitepaper) Annual Meeting in National Harbor, Md (Press release, Bellicum Pharmaceuticals, NOV 8, 2019, View Source [SID1234550762]). The poster titled "Solid Tumor Cytotoxicity by Natural Killer Cells Expressing a HER2-Directed Chimeric Antigen Receptor Enhanced by MyD88/CD40 (MC)" presented preclinical data demonstrating the effects of MC signaling on NK cell anti-tumor potency.

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The poster presented preclinical data using MyD88/CD40 (MC) cell signaling to enhance innate NK cell function, including augmented cytotoxicity and cytokine production against multiple tumor cell lines. MC signaling also improved in vitro and in vivo NK cell proliferation when coupled with autocrine IL-15 production. Co-expression of an antigen-specific CAR together with the MC/IL-15 system further increased anti-tumor efficacy against hematological and solid tumor targets. MC-augmented GoCAR-NK cells could represent a potent off-the-shelf cell therapy for the treatment of cancer.