GPC3-targeted CAR-T cells secreting B7H3-targeted BiTE exhibit potent cytotoxicity activity against hepatocellular carcinoma cell in the in vitro assay

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), the most common primary liver cancer has a high mortality in China, and it is usually diagnosed at a late stage, thereby leaving patients with few effective treatment options. Chimeric antigen receptor-T (CAR-T) cell therapy, a novel immunotherapy that has shown promising results in leukemia, lymphoma and multiple myeloma, is also expected to work well in solid tumors, including HCC. However, the ideal therapeutic efficacy has not yet been achieved, in part due to tumor antigen escape caused by antigen heterogeneity. To overcome such challenge, we screened a panel of biomarkers in HCC cell lines and found that GPC3 and B7H3 were highly expressed on HCC with expression heterogeneity. Then we developed a novel bispecific T cell engagers CAR-T (CAR.T-BiTEs) that drives the expression of a CAR specific for GPC3 and BiTEs against CD3 and B7H3, herein referred to as “GPC3-BiTE CAR.” We found that BiTEs promoted the increased activation of untransduced T cells and IFN-γ release. Moreover, BiTEs secreted by GPC3-BiTE CAR-HEK293T cells promoted increased cytotoxicity activity of untransduced T cells against GPC3+/B7H3+ (GPC3 positive/B7H3 positive) and GPC3-/B7H3+(GPC3 negative/B7H3 positive) HCC cell lines. In vitro function assays showed that GPC3-BiTE CAR-T cells exhibited greater cytotoxicity activity against GPC3+/B7H3+ HCC cell lines than GPC3 CAR-T cells (GPC3-targeted CAR-T cells) and B7H3 CAR-T cells (B7H3-targeted CAR-T cells). Furthermore, GPC3-BiTE CAR-T cells exhibited superior cytotoxicity against GPC3 negative HCC cell lines compared with GPC3 CAR T cells. In conclusion, our study showed that GPC3-BiTE CAR T cells exhibited superior antitumor activity than single-target CAR-T cells and can overcome tumor escape induced by antigen heterogeneity, suggesting that this could be a promising therapeutic strategy for HCC.