Nelarabine
For the treatment of pediatric and adult patients with acute T-cell lymphoblastic leukemia and T-cell lymphoblastic lymphoma whose disease has not responded to or has relapsed following treatment with at least two chemotherapy regimens.
Once nelarabine is metabolized into ara-GTP, the metabolite accumulates in leukemic blasts and incorporates into DNA to exert its S phase-specific cytotoxic effects, leading to the induction of fragmentation and apoptosis. Ara-GTP competes with endogenous deoxyGTP (dGTP) for incorporation into DNA. Once ara-GTP is incorporated at the 3' end of DNA, further DNA elongation is inhibited, which signals apoptosis and leads to cellular destruction. Additional cytotoxic activities may exist, but these are not fully understood.