A UCLA research team has identified the best design for a promising new type of immunotherapy that could be mass-produced to treat multiple solid tumors. The study focused on engineered invariant natural killer T cells, or NKT cells—powerful immune cells with a unique ability to infiltrate solid tumors—and systematically compared four targeting systems, called chimeric antigen receptors, or CARs, that direct these cells to attack cancer.

The study was published in the journal Blood Immunology & Cellular Therapy.

CAR-T cell therapies have revolutionized treatment for certain blood cancers like leukemia and lymphoma, but these successes haven’t extended to solid tumors, which make up the vast majority of cancers. Solid tumors build dense protective barriers that block therapeutic cells from reaching the cancer and display varied targets that allow cancer cells to escape detection.