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IL-2 in the immunotherapy of autoimmunity and cancer

Published on October 31, 2023   40 min

Other Talks in the Series: The Immune System - Key Concepts and Questions

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0:00
Hello, I'm Tom Malek. I'm professor and chair in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Miami, Miller School of Medicine. Today I'm going to discuss with you the current use of IL-2 in the immunotherapy of autoimmunity and cancer. I'm going to divide this lecture into three parts. First, give some background on the IL-2 receptor system. Then I'll move to talking about IL-2 and therapy for autoimmune diseases and also discuss a new IL-2 biologic that my lab has developed. Then finally discuss how IL-2 is being used for the therapy of cancer.
0:46
Before I begin, I need to disclose that I and the University of Miami have a sponsored research, an exclusive licensing agreement with Bristol Meyers Squibb related to this IL-2/CD25 fusion protein, which I'll talk more about later in the talk.
1:05
But as a start, I'd like to give some of the basics of the IL-2 receptor system. First to discuss what type of IL-2 receptors are there. There's two major forms, an intermediate affinity IL-2 receptor and the high affinity IL-2 receptor. These two types of receptors differ based on their sub unit composition. The intermediate affinity has two chains, IL-2 receptor, Beta and Gamma, or as shown on the slide, CD122 and CD132, and these are found primarily on CD8 memory T cells and natural killer cells. The high affinity receptor includes CD122 and CD 132 but also the IL-2 receptor alpha chain or CD25. This receptor is found on CD4 and CD8 T effector cells, on regulatory T cells and ILC2s in a small subset of NK cells. Now an important difference between the two is that much lower amount of IL-2 is necessary to trigger the high affinity receptor, approximately 100 fold less, so cells that express the high affinity receptor will be able to respond in environments of low IL-2.
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IL-2 in the immunotherapy of autoimmunity and cancer

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