Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cells and allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation

Dr Simonetta's clinical work is mainly focused on Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cells and allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). He is the medical coordinator of the CAR T cell program that he started at HUG in 2021. His main research interest is the development of immune-effector and immune-regulatory allogeneic cellular therapies for treatment of hematologic malignancies and graft-versus-host-disease (GvHD) respectively. In addition, he studies mechanisms of immune-reconstitution after allogeneic HSCT and CAR T cell therapy with a particular focus on the identification of biomarkers for immune-monitoring.  His team combines in vitro studies with ex vivo analysis on clinical samples obtained from patients from the allogeneic HSCT program led by Pr. Yves Chalandon. In addition, he has several local (Pr. Laurent Kaiser, HUG), national (Pr. Francesco Bertoni, IOR, Bellinzona) and international (Pr. Antonio Pierini, University of Perugia, Italy; Pr. Robert S. Negrin, Stanford University, USA) collaborations around these research topics.

EXPERTISE

- Multiparametric immunomonitoring (Flow cytometry, RNAseq, scRNAseq, TCRseq)
- CAR T cell generation, production and testing
- Molecular imaging of immune responses

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Lohmeyer JK, Hirai T, Turkoz M, Buhler S, Lopes Ramos T, Köhler N, Baker J, Melotti A, Wagner I, Pradier A, Wang S, Ji X, Becattini S, Villard J, Merkler D, Chalandon Y, Negrin RS*, Simonetta F*. Analysis of T cell Repertoire and Transcriptome Identifies Mechanisms of Regulatory T cell (Treg) Suppression of GvHD. Blood. 2022 Dec 27:blood.2022017982. doi: 10.1182/blood.2022017982. (*co-senior author).

Pradier A, Mamez AC, Stephan C, Giannotti F, Masouridi-Levrat S, Wang S, Morin S, Neofytos D, Vu DL, Melotti A, Arm I, Eberhardt CS, Tamburini J, Kaiser L, Chalandon Y, Simonetta F. T Cell Receptor Sequencing Reveals Reduced Clonal Breadth of T Cell Responses against SARS-CoV-2 after Natural Infection and Vaccination in Allogeneic Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant Recipients. Ann Oncol. 2022 Sep 15:S0923-7534(22)04144-8.

Simonetta F, Lohmeyer JK, Hirai T, Maas-Bauer K, Alvarez M, Wenokur AS, Baker J, Aalipour A, Ji X, Haile S, Mackall CL, Negrin RS. Allogeneic CAR Invariant Natural Killer T Cells Exert Potent Antitumor Effects through Host CD8 T-Cell Cross-Priming. Clin Cancer Res. 2021 Nov 1;27(21):6054-6064.

Maas-Bauer K, Lohmeyer JK, Hirai T, Ramos TL, Fazal FM, Litzenburger UM, Yost KE, Ribado JV, Kambham N, Wenokur AS, Lin PY, Alvarez M, Mavers M, Baker J, Bhatt AS, Chang HY, Simonetta F*, Negrin RS*. Invariant natural killer T-cell subsets have diverse graft-versus-host-disease-preventing and antitumor effects. Blood. 2021 Sep 9;138(10):858-870. (*co-senior author).

Simonetta F, Alam IS, Lohmeyer JK, Sahaf B, Good Z, Chen W, Xiao Z, Hirai T, Scheller L, Engels P, Vermesh O, Robinson E, Haywood T, Sathirachinda A, Baker J, Malipatlolla MB, Schultz LM, Spiegel JY, Lee JT, Miklos DB, Mackall CL, Gambhir SS, Negrin RS. Molecular Imaging of Chimeric Antigen Receptor T Cells by ICOS-ImmunoPET. Clin Cancer Res. 2021 Feb 15;27(4):1058-1068.

Check here his full list of publications.

AUTOIMMUNITY AND INFLAMMATION