Tunable differentiation of human CD4+ and CD8+ T cells from pluripotent stem cells

Allogeneic T cell therapies are a highly desirable option to circumvent the cost and complexity of using autologous T cells to treat diseases. Allogeneic CD8+ T cells can be made from pluripotent stem cells (PSCs), but deriving CD4+ T cells from PSCs remained a significant challenge. Using feeder- and serum-free conditions, we found that CD4+ versus CD8+ T cell commitment from PSCs can be controlled by fine-tuning the dynamics of Notch and T cell receptor signaling delivered to CD4+CD8+ double positive T cells. Notch signaling negatively impacts CD4+ T cell commitment, and its timed removal allows generation of clonally-diverse and expandable CD4+ T cells from PSCs. The resulting CD4+ T cells respond to cytokine-mediated polarization by differentiating into Th1, Th2, or Th17 cells, recapitulating canonical helper cell function. These findings represent a significant step towards using PSC-derived CD4+ T cells as a low cost, off-the-shelf, cell therapy.