Exploiting this approach to develop a therapeutic modality for T cell malignancies for which the available regimens are neither curative, nor confer long term survival we generated a lentivirus-based CAR gene transfer system to target the chemokine receptor CCR4 that is over-expressed in a spectrum of T cell malignancies as well as in CD4<sup>+</sup> CD25<sup>+</sup> Foxp3<sup>+</sup> T regulatory cells that accumulate in the tumor microenvironment constituting a barrier against anti-tumor immunity.
Our data suggest not only that the CCR4 molecule could be a suitable target for the novel antibody-based therapy for patients with ATLL but also that KM2760 may induce effective tumor immunity by reducing the number of regulatory T cells.