On February 13, 2026, the research team led by Professor Songmin Ying from the Center for Regeneration and Aging Medicine at Zhejiang University International Institutes of Medicine (ZJU-IIM), published a groundbreaking study in the Journal of Hematology & Oncology (IF=40.4), titled IL-5 CAR-T cell therapy induces durable remission in hypereosinophilic disorders.
Eosinophil-mediated disorders represent a major unmet clinical need, as current anti-IL-5/IL-5Rα monoclonal antibodies exhibit suboptimal efficacy and are associated with frequent disease relapse, and it remains a critical challenge to sustainably eradicate pathogenic eosinophils.
Using single-cell RNA sequencing, the team validated IL-5Rα as a highly specific and safe therapeutic target, which is stably and highly expressed across the entire eosinophil developmental lineage. They engineered humanized IL-5 CAR-T cells exerted potent and specific cytotoxicity against pathogenic eosinophils, with minimal off-target effects on other immune cells. Assays in murine models confirmed that the therapy exerts robust efficacy in reducing eosinophil burden, alleviating pathological damage and prolonging survival, with no severe adverse events observed in these models.
The team has establish a GMP-compliant manufacturing process for clinical-grade CAR-T cells production , with patents issued in China and Japan. Clinical trials have been initiated for patients with refractory hypereosinophilic syndrome (HES) and chronic eosinophilic leukemia (CEL). This full-lineage depletion strategy represents a promising precision therapeutic approach for eosinophil-mediated disorders and holds great promise for broad clinical translation.
Link to the full article：
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13045-026-01782-x
