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Giedre Krenciute, PhD
Giedre Krenciute, PhD

Education

PhD - Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX
BS - Vilnius University, Vilnius, Lithuania

Research Interests

The major goal of my research program is to develop CAR-modified T cells as an effective and safe therapy for childhood brain tumors that can then be readily translated into the clinic.

Current projects:

  • Generating and optimizing novel and safe CAR T cell-based therapies to target pediatric brain tumors.
  • Enhancing CAR T persistence and efficacy using different genetic manipulations.
  • Understanding tumor escape mechanism post CAR T cell treatment.
  • Understanding CAR T cell functional memory programs that control their long-term effector function.
  • Defining CAR T cell and brain tumor immune microenvironment (TIME) interactions using immune competent brain tumor models.

Selected Publications

Ibanez J, Hebbar N, Thanekar U, Yi Z, Houke H, Ward M, Nevitt C, Tian L, Mack SC, Sheppard H, Chiang J, Velasquez MP, Krenciute G. GRP78-CAR T cell effector function against solid and brain tumors is controlled by GRP78 expression on T cells. Cell Rep Med. 2023 Nov 21;4(11):101297. doi: 10.1016/j.xcrm.2023.101297. PMID: 37992682.

Haydar D, Ibañez-Vega J, Crawford JC, Chou CH, Guy CS, Meehl M, Yi Z, Perry S, Laxton J, Cunningham T, Langfitt D, Vogel P, DeRenzo C, Gottschalk S, Roussel MF, Thomas PG, Krenciute G. CAR T-cell design-dependent remodeling of the brain tumor-immune microenvironment modulates tumor-associated macrophages and anti-glioma activity. Cancer Res Commun. Nov 16, 2023. doi: 10.1158/2767-9764.CRC-23-0424. PMID: 37971169.

Flugel CL, Majzner RG, Krenciute G, Dotti G, Riddell SR, Wagner DL, Abou-El-Enein M. Overcoming on-target, off-tumour toxicity of CAR T cell therapy for solid tumours. Nat Rev Clin Oncol. 2023 Jan;20(1):49-62. doi: 10.1038/s41571-022-00704-3. Epub Nov 23, 2022. PMID: 36418477.

Carnevale J*, Shifrut E*, Kale N, Nyberg WA, Blaeschke F, Chen YY, Li Z, Bapat SP, Diolaiti ME, O'Leary P, Vedova S, Belk J, Daniel B, Roth TL, Bachl S, Anido AA, Prinzing B, Ibañez-Vega J, Lange S, Haydar D, Luetke-Eversloh M, Born-Bony M, Hegde B, Kogan S, Feuchtinger T, Okada H, Satpathy AT, Shannon K, Gottschalk S, Eyquem J*, Krenciute G*, Ashworth A*, Marson A*. RASA2 ablation in T cells boosts antigen sensitivity and long-term function. Nature. 2022 Sep;609(7925):174-182. doi: 10.1038/s41586-022-05126-w. Epub Aug 24, 2022. PMID: 36002574; PMCID: PMC9433322. *co-senior/co-corresponding authors

Prinzing B, Zebley CC, Petersen CT, Fan Y, Anido AA, Yi Z, Nguyen P, Houke H, Bell M, Haydar D, Brown C, Boi SK, Alli S, Crawford JC, Riberdy JM, Park JJ, Zhou S, Velasquez MP, DeRenzo C, Lazzarotto CR, Tsai SQ, Vogel P, Pruett-Miller SM, Langfitt DM, Gottschalk S*, Youngblood B*, Krenciute G*. Deleting DNMT3A in CAR T cells prevents exhaustion and enhances antitumor activity. Sci Transl Med. 2021 Nov 17;13(620):eabh0272. doi: 10.1126/scitranslmed.abh0272. Epub Nov 17, 2021. PMID: 34788079. *co-senior/co-corresponding authors

Haydar D, Houke H, Chiang J, Yi Z, Odé Z, Caldwell K, Zhu X, Mercer KS, Stripay JL, Shaw TI, Vogel P, DeRenzo C, Baker SJ, Roussel MF, Gottschalk S, Krenciute G. Cell surface antigen profiling of pediatric brain tumors: B7-H3 is consistently expressed and can be targeted via local or systemic CAR T-cell delivery. Neuro Oncol Dec 15:noaa278, 2020. doi: 10.1093/neuonc/noaa278. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33320196.

Prinzing B, Schreiner P, Bell M, Fan Y, Krenciute G*, Gottschalk S*. MyD88/CD40 signaling retains CAR T cells in a less differentiated state. JCI Insight Nov 5;5(21), 2020. doi: 10.1172/jci.insight.136093. PubMed PMID: 33148882. *co-senior authors

Wagner J, Wickman E, Shaw TI, Allo Anido A, Langfitt D, Zhang J, Porter SN, Pruett-Miller SM, Tillman H, Krenciute G, Gottschalk S. Antitumor effects of CAR T cells redirected to the EDB splice variant of fibronectin. Cancer Immunol Res Dec 22:canimm.0280.2020, 2020. doi: 10.1158/2326-6066.CIR-20-0280. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33355188.

Odé Z, Condori J, Peterson N, Zhou S, Krenciute G. CRISPR-Mediated Non-Viral Site-Specific Gene Integration and Expression in T Cells: Protocol and Application for T-Cell Therapy. Cancers (Basel) Jun 26;12(6), 2020. doi: 10.3390/cancers12061704. PubMed PMID: 32604839; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC7352666.

Petersen CT, Krenciute G. Next Generation CAR T Cells for the Immunotherapy of High-Grade Glioma. Front Oncol 9:69, 2019. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2019.00069. eCollection 2019. Review. PubMed PMID: 30863720; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC6399104.

Prinzing BL, Gottschalk SM, Krenciute G. CAR T-cell therapy for glioblastoma: ready for the next round of clinical testing? Expert review of anticancer therapy. 2018; :1-11.PMID: 29533108

Yi Z, Brooke LP, Cao F, Gottschalk S, Krenciute G. Optimizing EphA2-CAR T cells for the Adoptive Immunotherapy of Glioma. Molecular Therapy - Methods & Clinical Development. 2018 February 15; 9:70-80.

Mata M, Gerken C, Nguyen P, Krenciute G, Spencer DM, Gottschalk S. Inducible activation of MyD88 and CD40 in CAR T-cells results in controllable and potent antitumor activity in preclinical solid tumor models. Cancer Discov. 2017 Aug 11. pii: CD-17-0263. doi: 10.1158/2159-8290.CD-17-0263. PMID: 28801306

Krenciute G, Prinzing BL, Yi Z, Wu MF, Liu H, Dotti G, Balyasnikova IV, Gottschalk S. Transgenic expression of IL15 improves antiglioma activity of IL13Ralpha2-CAR T cells but results in antigen-loss variants. Cancer Immunol Res Jul;5(7):571-581, 2017. PMID: 28550091.

Krenciute G, Krebs S, Torres D, Wu MF, Liu H, Dotti G, Li XN, Lesniak MS, Balyasnikova IV, Gottschalk S. Characterization and functional analysis of scFv-based CARs to redirect T cells to IL13Rα2-positive glioma. Mol Ther Feb;24(2):354-63, 2016 PMID: 26514825.  doi: 10.1038/mt.2015.199.

See full list of publications

Last update: June 2024

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