Focus Understanding the peculiarities of immune cell life and death in order to improve cellular immunotherapy against cancer. Approaches Chimeric antigen receptor T cells (CAR-T) are an exciting new avenue to redirect immune cells to target and kill cancer. While breakthroughs in CAR-T therapy have led to life-saving treatments for patients with previously incurable leukemia, such therapies have been less successful against solid tumours. Moreover, the determinants of long term cancer regression in CAR-T treated patients are not yet well understood. Using genome editing, we are dissecting the mechanisms of programmed cell death and other immune signalling pathways in T cells in order to improve their effectiveness against cancer. Research Program NRC’s Vaccines and Immunotherapeutics program aims to develop novel immunotherapies that harness the body’s own immune system to fight cancer and emerging infections. Our labs focus on developing enabling technologies that can improve the success of cellular immunotherapies against cancer. We use in vitro and in vivo mouse models, human primary immune cell differentiation, immunophenotyping and functional assays to understand the tenets of CAR-T and other immune cell therapies against cancer. Our interests include strategies for improved targeting and functionality that could potentially lead to off-the shelf and/or multi-targeted immunotherapies.

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