In a paper published in Cell, a USC Stem Cell-led team reports a new way of generating a renewable and expandable supply of the progenitor cells that give rise to macrophages. These immune cells help drive the body’s response against pathogens, and they hold strong promise as the basis for immunotherapies against cancer and other diseases.

The paper, “Expansion and CAR Engineering of Granulocyte-Monocyte Progenitors for Cellular Immunotherapy,” demonstrates that progenitor cells known as granulocyte-monocyte progenitors (GMPs), which give rise to macrophages and other immune cells, can be extensively expanded in the laboratory and engineered both to target specific cancer markers and to help stimulate broader immune responses.

“The study establishes a scalable and engineerable GMP platform for cellular immunotherapy and introduces concepts that we believe could have broad implications for both cancer immunotherapy and stem cell biology,” said the paper’s corresponding author Qi-Long Ying, MD, Ph.D., professor of stem cell biology and regenerative medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of USC.