TScan Therapeutics, Inc.
The most clinically meaningful way to discover new targets of T cells in autoimmune diseases is to study the tissues of patients with active autoimmune disease mediated organ inflammation. These tissues contain both cytotoxic and helper T cells that are driving their disease, and these T cells are being guided by TCRs that recognize tissue-specific targets. By collecting tissue when a patient has active inflammation, it is possible to determine which T cells are activated and undergoing clonal expansion in the patient's diseased organ. TScan has developed a genome-wide, high-throughput technology to determine the natural, physiological target of any TCR (Kula, 2019). The goal of this study is to isolate T cells from inflamed tissues and matched blood samples and/or matched normal tissues (for patients with inflammatory bowel diseases). T cell clones that are expanded in diseased tissues relative to blood or normal tissues will be selected and the targets of their TCRs will be defined using TScan's genome-wide, high-throughput target ID technology. The goal of this study is to discover a collection of peptide targets, along with their associated TCRs to be developed as new tolerogenic therapies for patients with autoimmune diseases.
Cohort Legend: Cohort 1: Inflammatory Bowel Diseases - Crohn's Disease or Ulcerative Colitis, Cohort 2: Celiac Disease, Cohort 3: Ankylosing spondylitis or non-radiographic axial spondyloarthritis (nr-axSpA), Cohort 4: Multiple Sclerosis, Cohort 5: Scleroderma, Cohort 6: Systemic Sclerosis with pulmonary involvement, Cohort 7: Other Autoimmune Disease, Cohort 8: Apparent Evolving Autoimmune Disease, Cohort 9: Frozen Cryopreserved Inclusion Criteria: * Study cohorts 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8.9: Known or suspected diagnosis, with subsequent diagnostic confirmation, of one of the following cohorts associ…
Participants in all cohorts will have a companion blood sample obtained on or around the time of the procedure intended to obtain tissue or fluid.