Rosenberg and his team23 adapted a technique that had been developed in Israel that involved taking T cells from a patient’s blood, then using genetic engineering to add antigen receptors that were specifically targeted to the patient’s tumors. Now the T cells were programmed to attack the patient’s cancer. Known as chimeric antigen receptor T cells (or CAR-T), these modified T cells could be multiplied in the lab and then infused back into the patient.
