Abstract 45: Driving AMPK signaling in CD4+ CART cells enhances metabolic capacity, memory formation, and anti-leukemia activity
Authors: Braverman Erica , Schuler Herbert , Qin Mengtao , Byersdorfer Craig 
Published: March 2024

Background: While Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR)T cell therapy has seen great success in pediatric and young adult acute lymphoblastic leukemia, up to 50% of patients will relapse following treatment. Increased memory formation and mitochondrial capacity, particularly in the CD4+ subset, have been linked to improved CART cell function and enhanced in vivo persistence, leading to long-term relapse-free survival. AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) is a cellular energy sensor responsible for promoting metabolic efficiency and T cell memory formation. We have previously demonstrated AMPK activity can be increased in human T cells via overexpression of the AMPKγ2 domain. We hypothesized that overexpression of AMPKγ2 in CART cells would enhance their metabolic capacity and improve their anti-leukemia function.

Methods: Human CART cells bearing a CD19-CAR utilizing a 41BB costimulatory domain were generated from healthy human donors via lentiviral transduction and co-transduced with AMPKγ2 (AMPK) or an empty vector (EV) control. Flow sorting for the co-transduced populations yielded &gt;95% CD4+ CART cells. CARTs were expanded in IL-2 for approximately 2 weeks, followed by overnight stimulation and subsequent metabolic analysis using the Seahorse Metabolic Analyzer. Memory status was assessed by CD62L and CCR7 co-expression. In vitro CART function was assessed using Zs-green+ NALM6 targets, with loss of green fluorescence over time measured on the Incucyte analyzer. Where indicated, tumor conditioned media was harvested from 72-hour NALM6 cultures. For in vivo experiments, immunodeficient NOD-scid IL2Rγnull (NSG) mice were injected with luciferase+ NALM6 targets, followed one week later by AMPK- or EV-CARTs. Leukemia burden, via IVIS imaging, and survival were followed over time.

Results: CD4+ CARTs co-transduced with AMPKγ2 (AMPK-CARTs) increased oxygen consumption, maximal respiration, and spare respiratory capacity following overnight stimulation by ~20% compared to CARTs co-transduced with the EV (EV-CARTs) (p&lt;0.05). Following expansion, CD62L+CCR7+ central memory cells were 4.5-fold more abundant in the AMPK-CART group (2.4-6.2-fold, p&lt;0.01). In vitro, while AMPK-CARTs demonstrated similar cytotoxicity against NALM6 targets as EV-CARTs in standard media, they mediated faster killing of NALM6 targets when challenged in tumor conditioned media (p&lt;0.001). In vivo, recipients of AMPK-CARTs showed a consistent decrease in tumor burden as measured by median radiance values, translating to a significant survival advantage (p&lt;0.05).

Conclusions: Increasing AMPK signaling in CD4+ CARTs via overexpression of AMPKγ2 improved metabolic profile, increased memory generation, and enhanced toxicity against leukemia targets both in vitro and in vivo. Together, these features make elevating AMPK signaling an attractive method to increase the efficacy of CART therapy.

Citation Format: Erica Braverman, Herbert Schuler, Mengtao Qin, Craig Byersdorfer. Driving AMPK signaling in CD4+ CART cells enhances metabolic capacity, memory formation, and anti-leukemia activity [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2024; Part 1 (Regular Abstracts); 2024 Apr 5-10; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2024;84(6_Suppl):Abstract nr 45.