A Phase 1 interventional study of Cord Blood-derived Expanded Allogeneic Natural Killer Cells and Resection in Recurrent Gliosarcoma, Recurrent Supratentorial Glioblastoma and Supratentorial Gliosarcoma, sponsored by M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. Recruiting at 1 site in United States. Open to participants aged 12 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-09-04.
Sponsored by M.D. Anderson Cancer Center · Phase 1, Interventional, and Treatment
This phase I trial is to find out the best dose, possible benefits and/or side effects of engineered natural killer (NK) cells containing deleted TGF-betaR2 and NR3C1 (cord blood [CB]-NK-TGF-betaR2-/NR3C1-) in treating patients with glioblastoma that has come back (recurrent). CB-NK-TGF-betaR2-/NR3C1- cells are genetically changed immune cells that may help to control the disease.
PRIMARY OBJECTIVES:
SECONDARY OBJECTIVE:
-To determine response as measured by Response Assessment in Neuro-Oncology (RANO), duration of clinical response, progression free survival (PFS), time to progression (TTP), and overall survival (OS)ƒn
EXPLORATORY OBJECTIVES:
-Monitoring immune responses following CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1- dosing, in vivo persistence and expansion of CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1- during treatment, characterization of immune cell subpopulations in the peripheral blood, serum analysis of immune correlates, alloreactivity characterization, and anti-HLA antibody analysis, and CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1- trafficking in tumor microenvironments in the surgical expansion cohort. Tumor tissue from surgical resection will be further analyzed for immune infiltrates, fibrosis, and tumor microenvironment.
488 studies on the registry are indexed under Gliosarcoma; 14 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 25 is below the median of 37 across 389 interventional studies indexed under Gliosarcoma.
Browse Gliosarcoma studies →M.D. Anderson Cancer Center is the lead sponsor of 3,047 studies on the registry; 578 are open to participants now.
Of its 612 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 409 (67%) have results posted.
Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.
Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.
11. Female participant of should have a negative serum pregnancy test within 14 days (+/-2 working days) of study registration.
12. Female participants of childbearing potential should be willing to use 2 methods of or be surgically sterile, or abstain from heterosexual activity for the course of the study and for 3 months after the last dose of study therapy. Participants of childbearing potential are those who have not been surgically sterilized or have not been free from menses for > 1 year.
13. Male participants should agree to use 2 methods of highly effective contraception starting with the first dose of study therapy and for 3 months after the last dose of study therapy.
14. For the surgical expansion group (Group 2): there must be at least 1 cm2 of contrast-enhancing disease that is considered resectable by the neurosurgeon.
Exclusion Criteria
Has had prior chemotherapy or targeted small molecule therapy within 2 weeks prior to study Day 0.
Has a known additional that is progressing or requires active treatment.
Exceptions include but are not limited to basal cell carcinoma of the skin, squamous cell carcinoma of the skin, or in situ cervical cancer that has undergone potentially curative therapy. Any exceptions must be discussed with the protocol PI.
Treatment will be up to 32 weeks in duration.
The number of cells administered will be based on gene editing efficiency. CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1-cells will be administered via intraventricular injection via an Ommaya reservoir on day 0 and every 4 weeks y for up to 8 doses total in Group 1.
Surgical patients in Group 2 will undergo intraventricular insertion of an Ommaya (day -14 to -
1). They will then undergo IT injection via the Ommaya reservoir of CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1-cells on day 0. Prior to planned tumor resection to occur between days 7-14. Every 4 week intraventricular injections of CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1- cells will be administered for a total of 8 intraventricular treatments.
In the setting of any surgical complications following Ommaya placement, CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1- cells may be delayed and administered once the patient is deemed stable by the neurosurgeon following Ommaya placement.
Treatment will continue until tumor progression or intolerable toxicity, or a maximum of 8 intraventricular treatments with CB-NK-TGF-£]R2-/NR3C1- cells whichever occurs first.
Underlined terms in the criteria open these too. Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Before you join, the study team explains what taking part involves — its purpose, what happens, the risks and possible benefits — and answers your questions, so you can decide freely. Consent is usually recorded on a form (the informed consent form, ICF) signed by you or, where the law allows, by someone legally authorised to decide for you.
You can keep asking questions during the study, you are told of new information that matters, and you can choose to leave at any time.
The diagnosis was confirmed by looking at a sample under a microscope: tissue from a biopsy or surgery (histology), or cells from a fluid or needle sample (cytology).
Your pathology report is the document that shows this.
A 0–100 scale of how well someone can carry out everyday activities. 100 is no complaints and no signs of illness; 70 is able to look after yourself but not to work or keep up normal activity; 50 is needing considerable help and frequent medical care.
Studies often ask for 60 or 70 and above. Your doctor gives the score.
A biopsy takes a small piece of tissue to examine. “Archival tissue” is a sample already taken, for example at diagnosis, and kept by the hospital.
Whether a stored sample will do depends on when it was taken, how much there is and what the study needs. Ask whether the study accepts your stored sample or needs a new biopsy.
The number of neutrophils, white blood cells that help fight infection, in a given amount of blood. Too few raises the risk of infection.
It is a count, not a percentage of the white cells. Limits are written in units that mean the same: ≥ 1.5 × 10⁹/L is ≥ 1,500 per mm³ (µL). Each lab has its own reference range.
Blood cells that help blood clot. Too few raises the risk of bleeding and bruising. A usual adult range is about 150–400 × 10⁹/L (150,000–400,000 per µL); each lab has its own reference range.
The protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen. A low level is anaemia, which can cause tiredness and breathlessness. Measured in g/dL or g/L (9 g/dL is 90 g/L).
A yellow substance made when red blood cells are broken down, which the liver clears. A high level can mean a problem with the liver or the bile ducts.
Criteria often allow more for people with Gilbert’s syndrome, a harmless inherited condition that raises bilirubin.
The top of the normal range for a blood test, as set by the laboratory that runs it. Each lab prints its own range next to your result.
“≤ 2.5 × ULN” means the result can be up to two and a half times that top value.
Two enzymes measured in a routine blood test of the liver. Higher levels can mean the liver is under strain or damaged. SGPT and SGOT are older names for ALT and AST.
Criteria usually give a limit as a multiple of the upper limit of normal (ULN), often higher when cancer has spread to the liver.
Blood tests of how long blood takes to clot. The INR is the prothrombin time (PT) put on a common scale; about 1 is usual for someone not taking a blood thinner.
Criteria often make an exception for people on a blood thinner such as warfarin, whose INR is raised on purpose.
How quickly the kidneys clear creatinine, a waste product, from the blood. A study may estimate it from a blood test with age, weight and sex (often by the Cockcroft–Gault formula), or measure it using blood and urine collected over a set time. Given in mL/min; higher is better.
Able to become pregnant: from the first period until menopause, unless permanently unable to through surgery (removal of the womb, or of both ovaries or both fallopian tubes).
Criteria for people of childbearing potential usually ask for a negative pregnancy test and for contraception during the study and for a time after it.
Ways of preventing pregnancy. “Highly effective” methods fail less than 1% of the time a year when used correctly — for example an IUD or an implant.
Criteria usually say which methods count and how long to keep using them after the last dose, sometimes for male participants too. Some studies accept a partner’s vasectomy if it was confirmed successful and that person is the participant’s only sexual partner.
A drug or device being studied in a clinical trial.
It may be new, or already approved and being studied for another use, dose or form. Criteria often leave out people who took part in another study of one within a recent period, commonly 30 days or five half-lives.
An allergy, or another reaction of the immune system, to a substance. “Hypersensitivity to the study drug” means a known allergic reaction to it — not every side effect a medicine can have.
The human immunodeficiency virus, which weakens the immune system.
Many studies now accept people whose HIV is controlled on treatment, judged by the viral load and the CD4 count. Check the limits this study sets.
Hepatitis B is a virus that infects the liver. These are separate tests: HBsAg positive usually means a current infection (a recent vaccination can briefly cause it too); total anti-HBc (HBcAb) positive means an infection now or in the past; HBV DNA measures how much virus is in the blood.
Some studies accept a past infection if HBV DNA is undetectable, sometimes with antiviral medicine during the study. Check what this study allows.
Hepatitis C is a virus that infects the liver. An HCV antibody test can stay positive after an infection has cleared (and is occasionally positive without one); an HCV RNA test shows whether the virus is there now.
After treatment, hepatitis C counts as cured when HCV RNA is still undetectable 12 weeks or more after the treatment ended. Studies often accept people cured this way.
A weakened immune system. It can come from an illness, such as HIV or some blood cancers, or from medicines that turn the immune system down, for example after an organ transplant or for an autoimmune disease; steroids at higher doses count.
Read whether the line is about a condition or about medicines, and which medicines and doses it means.
PD-1, PD-L1 and CTLA-4 are proteins that act as brakes on the immune system. Checkpoint inhibitors, such as pembrolizumab or nivolumab, block them so the immune system can attack a cancer.
PD-L1 can also be measured in a tumour sample. Some scores count stained tumour cells only (TPS); others also count certain immune cells (CPS). The study names the score and the minimum it uses.
Malignancy means cancer. Criteria about another or earlier malignancy ask whether you have had a different cancer, usually within a set number of years.
Some are commonly allowed, such as treated skin cancers other than melanoma and early cancers removed completely — check the exceptions this study lists.
A condition in which the immune system attacks the body’s own tissues, such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, psoriasis, type 1 diabetes or inflammatory bowel disease.
Immunotherapy studies often leave out active autoimmune disease, and some name exceptions, such as thyroid disease on replacement hormone. Check the exceptions this study lists.
Anti-inflammatory medicines such as prednisone, prednisolone and dexamethasone — not the anabolic steroids used for muscle.
Studies differ in what they allow: check which steroid medicines, routes (tablets, injections, creams, inhalers, eye drops) and doses this study accepts.
Vaccines made with a weakened form of the germ, such as measles–mumps–rubella (MMR), chickenpox and yellow fever. They can be risky when the immune system is weakened. Flu injections are not live; the nasal flu spray is.
A reason a treatment, test or procedure should not be given to a particular person, such as an allergy, another illness or a medicine they take.
Stem cell (bone marrow) transplants. Allogeneic uses cells from a donor; autologous uses your own cells, collected earlier and given back.
Informed consent
Before you join, the study team explains what taking part involves — its purpose, what happens, the risks and possible benefits — and answers your questions, so you can decide freely. Consent is usually recorded on a form (the informed consent form, ICF) signed by you or, where the law allows, by someone legally authorised to decide for you.
You can keep asking questions during the study, you are told of new information that matters, and you can choose to leave at any time.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Histologically or cytologically confirmed
The diagnosis was confirmed by looking at a sample under a microscope: tissue from a biopsy or surgery (histology), or cells from a fluid or needle sample (cytology).
Your pathology report is the document that shows this.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Karnofsky performance status (KPS)
A 0–100 scale of how well someone can carry out everyday activities. 100 is no complaints and no signs of illness; 70 is able to look after yourself but not to work or keep up normal activity; 50 is needing considerable help and frequent medical care.
Studies often ask for 60 or 70 and above. Your doctor gives the score.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Biopsy and archival tissue
A biopsy takes a small piece of tissue to examine. “Archival tissue” is a sample already taken, for example at diagnosis, and kept by the hospital.
Whether a stored sample will do depends on when it was taken, how much there is and what the study needs. Ask whether the study accepts your stored sample or needs a new biopsy.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Absolute neutrophil count (ANC)
The number of neutrophils, white blood cells that help fight infection, in a given amount of blood. Too few raises the risk of infection.
It is a count, not a percentage of the white cells. Limits are written in units that mean the same: ≥ 1.5 × 10⁹/L is ≥ 1,500 per mm³ (µL). Each lab has its own reference range.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Platelets
Blood cells that help blood clot. Too few raises the risk of bleeding and bruising. A usual adult range is about 150–400 × 10⁹/L (150,000–400,000 per µL); each lab has its own reference range.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Hemoglobin (Hb)
The protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen. A low level is anaemia, which can cause tiredness and breathlessness. Measured in g/dL or g/L (9 g/dL is 90 g/L).
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Bilirubin
A yellow substance made when red blood cells are broken down, which the liver clears. A high level can mean a problem with the liver or the bile ducts.
Criteria often allow more for people with Gilbert’s syndrome, a harmless inherited condition that raises bilirubin.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
ULN (upper limit of normal)
The top of the normal range for a blood test, as set by the laboratory that runs it. Each lab prints its own range next to your result.
“≤ 2.5 × ULN” means the result can be up to two and a half times that top value.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
ALT and AST (liver enzymes)
Two enzymes measured in a routine blood test of the liver. Higher levels can mean the liver is under strain or damaged. SGPT and SGOT are older names for ALT and AST.
Criteria usually give a limit as a multiple of the upper limit of normal (ULN), often higher when cancer has spread to the liver.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
INR, PT and aPTT (clotting tests)
Blood tests of how long blood takes to clot. The INR is the prothrombin time (PT) put on a common scale; about 1 is usual for someone not taking a blood thinner.
Criteria often make an exception for people on a blood thinner such as warfarin, whose INR is raised on purpose.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Creatinine clearance (CrCl)
How quickly the kidneys clear creatinine, a waste product, from the blood. A study may estimate it from a blood test with age, weight and sex (often by the Cockcroft–Gault formula), or measure it using blood and urine collected over a set time. Given in mL/min; higher is better.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Childbearing potential
Able to become pregnant: from the first period until menopause, unless permanently unable to through surgery (removal of the womb, or of both ovaries or both fallopian tubes).
Criteria for people of childbearing potential usually ask for a negative pregnancy test and for contraception during the study and for a time after it.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Contraception
Ways of preventing pregnancy. “Highly effective” methods fail less than 1% of the time a year when used correctly — for example an IUD or an implant.
Criteria usually say which methods count and how long to keep using them after the last dose, sometimes for male participants too. Some studies accept a partner’s vasectomy if it was confirmed successful and that person is the participant’s only sexual partner.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Investigational drug or device
A drug or device being studied in a clinical trial.
It may be new, or already approved and being studied for another use, dose or form. Criteria often leave out people who took part in another study of one within a recent period, commonly 30 days or five half-lives.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Hypersensitivity
An allergy, or another reaction of the immune system, to a substance. “Hypersensitivity to the study drug” means a known allergic reaction to it — not every side effect a medicine can have.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
HIV
The human immunodeficiency virus, which weakens the immune system.
Many studies now accept people whose HIV is controlled on treatment, judged by the viral load and the CD4 count. Check the limits this study sets.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Hepatitis B tests
Hepatitis B is a virus that infects the liver. These are separate tests: HBsAg positive usually means a current infection (a recent vaccination can briefly cause it too); total anti-HBc (HBcAb) positive means an infection now or in the past; HBV DNA measures how much virus is in the blood.
Some studies accept a past infection if HBV DNA is undetectable, sometimes with antiviral medicine during the study. Check what this study allows.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Hepatitis C tests
Hepatitis C is a virus that infects the liver. An HCV antibody test can stay positive after an infection has cleared (and is occasionally positive without one); an HCV RNA test shows whether the virus is there now.
After treatment, hepatitis C counts as cured when HCV RNA is still undetectable 12 weeks or more after the treatment ended. Studies often accept people cured this way.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Immunosuppression
A weakened immune system. It can come from an illness, such as HIV or some blood cancers, or from medicines that turn the immune system down, for example after an organ transplant or for an autoimmune disease; steroids at higher doses count.
Read whether the line is about a condition or about medicines, and which medicines and doses it means.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
PD-1, PD-L1 and checkpoint inhibitors
PD-1, PD-L1 and CTLA-4 are proteins that act as brakes on the immune system. Checkpoint inhibitors, such as pembrolizumab or nivolumab, block them so the immune system can attack a cancer.
PD-L1 can also be measured in a tumour sample. Some scores count stained tumour cells only (TPS); others also count certain immune cells (CPS). The study names the score and the minimum it uses.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Cancer (malignancy)
Malignancy means cancer. Criteria about another or earlier malignancy ask whether you have had a different cancer, usually within a set number of years.
Some are commonly allowed, such as treated skin cancers other than melanoma and early cancers removed completely — check the exceptions this study lists.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Autoimmune disease
A condition in which the immune system attacks the body’s own tissues, such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, psoriasis, type 1 diabetes or inflammatory bowel disease.
Immunotherapy studies often leave out active autoimmune disease, and some name exceptions, such as thyroid disease on replacement hormone. Check the exceptions this study lists.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Corticosteroids (steroids)
Anti-inflammatory medicines such as prednisone, prednisolone and dexamethasone — not the anabolic steroids used for muscle.
Studies differ in what they allow: check which steroid medicines, routes (tablets, injections, creams, inhalers, eye drops) and doses this study accepts.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Live vaccines
Vaccines made with a weakened form of the germ, such as measles–mumps–rubella (MMR), chickenpox and yellow fever. They can be risky when the immune system is weakened. Flu injections are not live; the nasal flu spray is.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Contraindication
A reason a treatment, test or procedure should not be given to a particular person, such as an allergy, another illness or a medicine they take.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Allogeneic and autologous transplant
Stem cell (bone marrow) transplants. Allogeneic uses cells from a donor; autologous uses your own cells, collected earlier and given back.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Participants will receive CB-NK-TGF-betaR2-/NR3C1- intratumorally over 10 minutes followed by 1 ml of Normal Saline injected over additional 10 min via Ommaya catheter every four weeks for up to 8 doses in the absence of disease progression or unacceptable toxicity.
Biological: Cord Blood-derived Expanded Allogeneic Natural Killer Cells
Ommaya catheter will be inserted prior to the 1st injection of NK cells (at the time of screening biopsy). Two weeks prior to Surgical resection participants will receive the 1st dose of CB-NK-TGF-betaR2-/NR3C1- intratumorally over 10 minutes followed by 1 ml of Normal Saline injected over an additional 10 min via Ommaya catheter. Ommaya catheter will be taken out at the time of standard of care surgical resection of the tumor on day 15 and then another one will be inserted at the end of surgery for future IT injections. Beginning 2 weeks after surgery, participants will receive CB-NK-TGF-betaR2-/ NR3C1- intratumorally over 10 minutes followed by 1 ml of Normal Saline injected over additional 10 min via Ommaya catheter every 4 weeks for up to 7 doses (total of 8 doses) in the absence of disease progression or unacceptable toxicity.
Biological: Cord Blood-derived Expanded Allogeneic Natural Killer Cells · Procedure: Resection
Given CB-NK-TGF-betaR2-/NR3C1- intratumorally
Also known as: Allogeneic CB-derived Ex vivo-expanded NK Cells, CB-derived Expanded Allogeneic NK Cells, UCB-derived Expanded Allogeneic NK Cells, Umbilical Cord Blood-derived Expanded Allogeneic Natural Killer Cells
Undergo surgical resection
Also known as: Surgical Resection
Incidence of dose-limiting toxicities (DLTs) (Group 1)
Will determine maximum tolerated dose and safety of escalating doses of cord blood (CB)-(NK) cells patients with recurrent glioblastoma. A DLT is defined as any grade \>= 3 adverse event assessed as related to CB-NK cells by the investigator (that is, grade \>= 3 adverse drug reaction; grading according to the National Cancer Institute-Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events version 4.03.
Time frame: Up to 28 days
Overall survival (OS)
OS will be estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method and the comparison between or among patients' characteristics groups will be evaluated by log-rank test. Cox regression models will be applied to assess the effect of covariates of interest on OS.
Time frame: From definitive histological diagnosis until the time of death, assessed up to 90 days post-treatment
Objective response rate (ORR)
ORR will be defined as the proportion of patients with tumor size reduction (partial response and complete response, per Response Assessment in Neuro-Oncology \[RANO\] criteria). Will be calculated as the ratio of number of patients with response over number of patients treated, and 95% confidence interval of ORR will be estimated.
Time frame: Up to 90 days post-treatment
Duration of response (DOR)
Time frame: From the time of initial response until documented tumor progression per RANO criteria, assessed up to 90 days
Time to progression (TTP)
TTP will be estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method and the comparison between or among patients' characteristics groups will be evaluated by log-rank test. Cox regression models will be applied to assess the effect of covariates of interest on TTP.
Time frame: From the date of start of treatment until the tumor progression as defined by RANO, assessed up to 90 days post-treatment
Progression-free survival (PFS)
PFS will be estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method and the comparison between or among patients' characteristics groups will be evaluated by log-rank test. Cox regression models will be applied to assess the effect of covariates of interest on PFS. The point estimate of median PFS and 6-month progression-free survival (PFS6) will be estimated.
Time frame: From the start of treatment until the time of first disease progression or relapse (as defined by RANO criteria), or death due to disease, assessed up to 6 months post-treatment
Started Apr 2023 (actual). Primary completion is estimated for Jan 2027, 45 months after the start.
Of 48 non-industry phase 1 interventional studies under Gliosarcoma, half reached primary completion within 53 months of starting (the median), counting those still running; a quarter within 35 and three quarters within 90. This study's planned 45 months is below that.
Counting every sponsor, half of 54 studies reached it within 59 months; a quarter within 36 and three quarters within 106.
How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.
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