New Method Produces Longer-Lasting CAR-T Cells to Fight Disease

Research team develops manufacturing approach to generate immune cells with improved persistence and self-renewal capabilities.

Mar. 13, 2026 at 6:36pm

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A research team led by scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine has developed a new strategy to engineer immune cells that dramatically prolongs their effectiveness after being infused into patients to fight cancer and HIV. Their findings, published in Science Advances, describe a manufacturing approach that generates longer-lasting CAR-T cells with enhanced self-renewal capabilities compared to the existing process.

Why it matters

Current CAR-T cell therapies have shown initial promise, but their killing ability often diminishes over time, leading to disease relapse in roughly half of treated cancer patients. The same persistence problem has constrained efforts to extend CAR-T therapy to treat people living with HIV. This new method aims to overcome these limitations by producing CAR-T cells that can patrol the body for years, continually hunting down and eliminating residual malignant or infected cells.

The details

The research team developed an alternative approach for producing CAR-T cells using a specially engineered fusion protein called HCW9206, which links three naturally occurring cytokines known to promote T cell survival and immune memory. When used to generate CAR-T cells, this multi-cytokine scaffold approach resulted in a higher proportion of long-lived T memory stem cells compared to the standard activation protocol. In mouse models, the multi-cytokine scaffold-generated CAR-T cells exhibited enhanced antitumor and antiviral potency, including a strong "recall" response to prevent tumor recurrence.

  • The findings were published on March 13, 2026 in the journal Science Advances.

The players

Albert Einstein College of Medicine

One of the nation's premier academic centers for basic science research, clinical investigation, and biomedical education, located in the Bronx, New York.

Harris Goldstein, M.D.

Senior author of the study, professor of pediatrics and microbiology & immunology, and director of the Einstein-Rockefeller-CUNY-Mount Sinai Center for AIDS Research at Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

Erin Cole, M.S.

Graduate student in Dr. Goldstein's laboratory and first author of the study.

HCW Biologics, Inc.

A biotechnology company based in Miramar, Florida that developed the HCW9206 fusion protein used in the study.

Caring Cross

A biotechnology company based in Gaithersburg, Maryland that collaborated on the study.

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What they’re saying

“Our goal was to engineer therapeutic immune cells so they would not only be powerful killers but also long-lived and capable of self-renewal, to markedly extend their effectiveness after infusion into patients.”

— Harris Goldstein, M.D., Professor of pediatrics and microbiology & immunology, and director of the Einstein-Rockefeller-CUNY-Mount Sinai Center for AIDS Research (Science Advances)

“T memory stem cells are considered to be critical for long-term immune persistence. They can continually replenish the pool of active CAR-T cells, a crucially important attribute for their long-term success in combating both cancer and HIV infection.”

— Harris Goldstein, M.D., Professor of pediatrics and microbiology & immunology, and director of the Einstein-Rockefeller-CUNY-Mount Sinai Center for AIDS Research (Science Advances)

What’s next

The findings from this research could have important implications across the CAR-T cell field, potentially reducing blood cancer relapse rates and improving long-term remission for cancer patients, as well as helping maintain viral control in people living with HIV after stopping antiretroviral therapy, a critical step toward a functional cure.

The takeaway

This new method for producing CAR-T cells with enhanced persistence and self-renewal capabilities represents a significant advancement in the field, addressing a major limitation of current CAR-T therapies and offering hope for more durable and effective treatments for both cancer and HIV.