B-precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (BP-ALL) patients are immunocompromised. We recently reported that functional natural killer (NK) cells can be grown from patient bone marrow and blood samples at diagnosis. Surprisingly, such NK cells exhibit cytotoxicity against autologous BP-ALL cells. Here, we outline unanswered questions, challenges and possible applications associated with these findings.
Keywords: ADCC; BP-ALL; adoptive cell therapy; artificial antigen presenting; autologous; expanded NK; pre-B ALL.