Project lead Charité:
Amini group - part of the BeCAT AND IMMUNOLOGY PLATFORM AT THE BIH

Amini group is part of the Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Berlin Center for Advanced Therapies (BeCAT), which represents a crucial institution for the translation of adoptive T-cells to the patient’s bedside. Furthermore, we are part of the Berlin Institute of Health (BIH) at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, BIH – Center for Regenerative Therapies (BCRT) where we stand in strong cooperation with the in-house GMP facility as well as the platform of Immunology at the Cranach-Haus.

We are an interdisciplinary and cooperative junior group excited to build a new groundwork for patient specific, GMP compliant anti-viral T-cell therapeutics. We have extensive knowledge in the field of adoptive anti-viral T-cell therapy, and we have already generated CMV as well as Sars-Cov-2 specific T-cell products for clinical application.

Photography ©HeidiScherm

Project lead DRFZ:
Mashreghi group - part of the DRFZ

Mashreghi’s research group is specialized in studying cells individually in order to determine which genes and antigens they express, suggesting their role in the immune response. The technological know-how is based on the use of oligonucleotide-coupled antibodies for labelling of surface proteins (CITE-Seq), the generation of 10X Genomics based single cell cDNA libraries (10X Genomics 5`Next GEM) followed by NGS sequencing (Illumina), the analysis of the antigen receptor repertoire (single-cell V(D)J sequencing) of B and T lymphocytes at the single-cell level in the context of their global gene and surface protein signature. The expertise of this research group offers a unique opportunity to study immune responses, in particular currently, in collaboration with virological and clinical research groups.

To drfz website

Berlin Center for Advanced Therapies (BeCAT) at Charité - Enabling New Drugs and Innovative Therapeutic Approaches in Regenerative Medicine, Hematology and Oncology. The Berlin Center for Advanced Therapies (BeCAT ) pursues a new research concept for the development and application of advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMPs) in a state-of-the-art research structure at the Charité Campus Virchow-Klinikum. The new building to be constructed for the implementation of the concept is being funded with more than 29,000,000.00 euros pro rata by the Federal Government and the State of Berlin within the framework of the program for research buildings at universities (§ 91b GG).

To Becat website

Advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMPs) are medicinal products for human use. They are no longer synthetic agents for the relief of symptoms, but biological medicines for the restoration of the patient's health. Often referred to as "living medicines," they break with the principles of classical drug development and open up completely new possibilities for the treatment of previously incurable diseases. The Berlin Center for Advanced Therapies (BeCAT) is engaged in the development of ATMPs for diseases with high unmet medical need and holds a manufacturing license for several T-cell products. BeCAT has a state-of-the-art GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) facility that enables it to manufacture all classes of ATMPs as investigational products, including in combination with biomaterials and with 3D-printed systems.

Prof. Dr. med. Petra Reinke

Nephrologist, founding director of BeCAT, and qualified person for the GMP facility.

Dr. Andy Römhild

Biotechnologist and head of the production unit at the BeCAT GMP facility.

Daniel Kaiser

Biotechnologist and Head of Quality Management & Control (QM/QC)

Dr. Leila Amini

Head of the Regulatory Affairs Department and Junior Research Group Leader Process Development.

Enrico Fritsche

Biochemist - Regulatory Affairs Unit

Dr. Jaspal Kaeda

Molecularbiologist - Regulatory Affairs Unit

Prof. Dr. med. Hans-Dieter Volk is Senior Professor at the Institute of Medical Immunology of Charité, member of the founding board as well as long-time Director Emeritus of the BIH Center for Regenerative Therapies (BCRT) and CSO of CheckImmune GmbH. Prof. Dr. med. Hans-Dieter Volks Tissue Immunology Group performs immune monitoring of regenerative therapies and develops biomarkers and matching analyses. It also investigates immune modulation by stem cells in vitro and in vivo. In addition, they analyze the interaction between the immune system and biomaterials in vitro and in vivo.

Prof. Dr. med. Hans-Dieter Volk

Senior professor Institute for Medical Immunology.

Dr. Anna-Catharina Michaela Krebs

medical biotechnologist and Postdoc Tissue-Immunology group.

Dr. Michael Schmück-Henneresse

Leader of the platform Immunology and group leader for Experimental Immunotherapy.

Dr. Lukas Ehlen

Anesthesiologist and postdoc in the Experimental Immunotherapy Group

Dr. med. Mir Timo Zadegh Nazari-Shafti

Cardiac Surgeon, BIH Clinician Scientist, Junior Group Leader Cardiovascular Research

Dr. med. Philipp Knape

Cardiac Surgeon and senior physician

The Amini group is led by Dr. Leila Amini as principal investigator and head of the regulatory affairs unit at the BeCAT. Furthermore, our young postdoctoral researcher Lisa Burkhardt comes with elaborated background in clinical immunology and drug characterization. We are focusing on the generation of various anti-viral T-cell products (TCPs). Our three doctoral students Ugarit Daher, Niklas Wiese and Ghazaleh Zarrinrad focus on specific generation, investigation, and characterization of TCPs.

All of them work on own research projects concerning either adoptive regulatory T-cells or adoptive anti-viral T-cells with viral specificities such as Influenza, BK-virus, and EBV in various disease contexts and further optimize the clinical application of SARS-CoV-2 and CMV specific T-cells. The Bench to Bedside principle of adoptive anti-viral T-cells is strongly depending on GMP compliant approaches. This is where the expertise of our lab technician Melanie Rothe is focused and where we heavily interact with our cooperation partners from the GMP facility.

Our final clinical virus-specific T-cell warriors undergo in-depth characterization so that potential patients can be treated in a safe and effective way and in this part of the project, we benefit of our cooperation with the Proteomics Core, the Single-Cell-Core as well as the Immune Monitoring group CheckImmune. We envision to elaborate even more on our novel and quite unique platform by including human based organ-on-a-chip models for further assessment of the impact of our T-cell warriors in a 3D organoid approach. This is where we are connected to specialists from the Tissue-Immunology group with strong background on mulit-organ chip based pre-clinical models.

Photography ©HeidiScherm