Immunoreceptor Engineering and Synthetic Cytokine Signaling for Therapeutics

Cytokines control immune-related events and are critically involved in a plethora of physiological and pathophysiological processes including autoimmunity and cancer development. Accordingly, modulation of natural cytokine signaling by antibodies and small molecules has improved therapeutic regimens. Synthetic biology sets out to optimize immunotherapeutics, with chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell immmunotherapy being the first example to combine synthetic biology with genetic engineering during therapy. Hence, synthetic cytokines and cytokine receptors, as well as constitutively active cytokine receptor variants, are emerging as tools to improve or modulate immunotherapeutic strategies. This review focuses on recent developments in the growing field of synthetic cytokine signaling, providing an outlook for developing applications that involve physiological targets of immunotherapy.