%ARath, Jan%ABajwa, Gagan%ACarreres, Benoit%AHoyer, Elisabeth%AGruber, Isabelle%AMartínez-Paniagua, Melisa%AYu, Yi-Ru%ANouraee, Nazila%ASadeghi, Fatemeh%AWu, Mengfen%AWang, Tao%AHebeisen, Michael%ARufer, Nathalie%AVaradarajan, Navin%AHo, Ping-Chih%ABrenner, Malcolm%AGfeller, David%AArber, Caroline%BJournal Name: Science Advances; Journal Volume: 6; Journal Issue: 27 %D2020%I %JJournal Name: Science Advances; Journal Volume: 6; Journal Issue: 27 %K %MOSTI ID: 10195218 %PMedium: X %TSingle-cell transcriptomics identifies multiple pathways underlying antitumor function of TCR- and CD8αβ-engineered human CD4 + T cells %XTransgenic coexpression of a class I–restricted tumor antigen–specific T cell receptor (TCR) and CD8αβ (TCR8) redirects antigen specificity of CD4 + T cells. Reinforcement of biophysical properties and early TCR signaling explain how redirected CD4 + T cells recognize target cells, but the transcriptional basis for their acquired antitumor function remains elusive. We, therefore, interrogated redirected human CD4 + and CD8 + T cells by single-cell RNA sequencing and characterized them experimentally in bulk and single-cell assays and a mouse xenograft model. TCR8 expression enhanced CD8 + T cell function and preserved less differentiated CD4 + and CD8 + T cells after tumor challenge. TCR8 + CD4 + T cells were most potent by activating multiple transcriptional programs associated with enhanced antitumor function. We found sustained activation of cytotoxicity, costimulation, oxidative phosphorylation– and proliferation-related genes, and simultaneously reduced differentiation and exhaustion. Our study identifies molecular features of TCR8 expression that can guide the development of enhanced immunotherapies. %0Journal Article