A Phase 1 interventional study of Eight Treg in Kidney Transplantation, sponsored by Nantes University Hospital. Recruiting at 1 site in France. Open to participants aged 18 Years to 99 Years. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-04-29.
Sponsored by Nantes University Hospital · Phase 1, Interventional, and Treatment
The only curative treatment for end-stage renal disease is through kidney transplantation. Solid organ transplants success had been made possible by the development of Immunosuppressive (IS) drugs. However, the long-term survival of transplants is still shortened by the chronic dysfunction of the graft which is not prevented by current IS regimens. Moreover, these IS drugs increase the risk of opportunistic infections and malignancies, and have many non-immune side-effects that hamper their tolerability.
New research strategies are, therefore, developed with the aim of reducing the dependence on conventional pharmacological IS drugs. Regulatory cell therapy is one of these strategies. It consists of expanding specific populations of immune regulatory cells ex vivo into cell-based drugs that can then be infused into transplant recipients, with the goal of inducing graft tolerance.
This is the framework of this clinical trial. The experimental drug "Eight Treg" being evaluated in this study is an autologous cell therapy product containing CD8+ regulatory T lymphocytes (Tregs) expanded ex vivo during 21 days of cell culture. Team 2 of the Center for Research in Transplantation and Translational Immunology (CR2TI), Nantes University, INSERM, Mixed Research Unit (UMR) 1064, responsible for developing the manufacturing process of the experimental drug "Eight Treg", has demonstrated the feasibility of the expansion of CD8+ Tregs ex vivo and their ability to prevent skin graft rejection and inhibit Graft Versus Host Disease (GVHD) in NOD-Scid-IL-2γ-/- mouse models (NSG)14.
Based on the preclinical experience of CR2TI team 2, which has been working on basic and translational aspects of CD8+ Tregs for 15 years, the present phase I clinical trial aims to assess the safety of increasing doses of the experimental drug "Eight Treg" in 9 recipients of renal transplantation from a living donor. The possibility of manufacturing the experimental drug "Eight Treg" at the required doses, in accordance with the Good Manufacturing Process (GMP), has been assessed in validation runs as specified at the end of the "justification of the study" part of this protocol. This clinical trial will be the first administration of expanded CD8+ Tregs into humans, and it follows previous studies which evaluated the safety of other regulatory cell therapy products, containing expanded CD4+ Tregs and other regulatory cells (autologous tolerogenic dendritic cells performed by Nantes CHU laboratory and clinical services, for example), injected into patients in different contexts (renal transplantation, liver transplantation, GVHD, type 1 diabetes, etc) without causing any significant adverse effect. This study will pave the way for future, broader research on the use of CD8+ Tregs as a possible anti-rejection and tolerance inducer "drug" in transplantation.
Nantes University Hospital is the lead sponsor of 825 studies on the registry; 195 are open to participants now.
Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.
for kidney transplant recipient: pre-Inclusion Criteria:
Inclusion Criteria:
Respects the following conditions:
Condition 2 (depending on the dose level considered):
Pre-Exclusion Criteria:
Exclusion Criteria:
Donor:
Pre-Inclusion Criteria:
The experimental drug "Eight Treg"is given to patients with a peripheral IV infusion the day before the graft in addition to the maintenance protocol combining corticosteroids, tacrolimus and MPA which are classically pre-scribed in kidney graft patients from a living donor at the Nantes CHU.
Drug: Eight Treg
The experimental drug "Eight Treg" is given to patients with a peripheral IV infusion the day before the graft (cf section "5.1.5. "Infusion of the experimental drug" of this protocol) in addition to the maintenance protocol combining corticosteroids, tacrolimus and MPA which are classically pre-scribed in kidney graft patients from a living donor at the Nantes CHU.
Number of participants with treatment-related adverse events as assessed by CTCAE v4.0 up to 3 months post-graft
Time frame: 3 months
Occurrence of a dose-limiting toxicity, defined as the occurrence of an AE of grade 3 or higher (with exceptions: see specific section) up to visit 10, at 3 months post-transplantation.
Time frame: 3 months
Number of participants with the (absence or low) occurrence of a dose limiting toxicity at 6 and 12 months post-graft
Time frame: 12 months
Number of participants with the (no or low stage of) graft inflammation at 3-months post-graft
Time frame: 3 months
Number of participants with the (lower) total immunosuppressive burden at one post-transplant year
Time frame: 12 months
Number of participants with the (lower) incidence, duration and severity of infections during the first year post-graft compared to historical data from previously reported studies
Time frame: 12 months
Biological evaluation of the impact of CD8+ Treg cell therapy on immune response by real time follow-up of blood cell count by flow cytometry (FC) to evaluate and characterize cellular and humoral immune responses towards the graft
Time frame: 12 months
Comparison of Tregs profile and clones emerging in the "Eight-Treg" group by scRNAseq and VDJseq compared to reference group
Time frame: 12 months
Plan to share: Undecided
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