Dr. Pal on CRISPR-Based Technology in RCC

Sumanta Kumar Pal, MD, an associate clinical professor, Department of Medical Oncology and Therapeutics Research, co-director, Kidney Cancer Program, and medical oncologist at City of Hope, discusses potential developments with vaccines and CRISPR/Cas9 technology coming down the pipeline in renal cell carcinoma (RCC).

Immunotherapy, particularly CAR T-cell therapy, has been challenging to develop in solid tumors, leading to further exploration with novel techniques, Pal says. More recently, Pal has been working with CRISPR to develop anti-CD70 CAR T cells.

Targeting a specific antigen has always been a challenge in RCC, Pal says. With CRISPR, a unique target has been identified and appears to have potential benefit in a large proportion of RCC patients.