Advances in Research (AiR) Conference - Caitlin Zebley, MD, PhD
Location: Egleston Classroom 5 and Zoom
From Dr. Zebley herself: "My research focuses on exploiting our understanding of epigenetic mechanisms regulating human memory CD8 T cell differentiation and applying the insights we gained toward the development of novel or enhanced cellular therapies. My work demonstrates that T cell exhaustion is a limiting factor of current CAR T cell approaches. My past and ongoing efforts have demonstrated that it is indeed possible to overcome these obstacles of exhaustion and engineer T cells with specific epigenetic programs that imparts them with disease-relevant long-lived immunological properties. Notably, I have worked toward establishing an epigenetic-based T cell differentiation atlas that has enabled my research group, and others in the field, to perform a broad and universal characterization of T cell memory differentiation. I am now studying mutations that occur during clonal hematopoiesis (CH) and investigating how disruption of these key epigenetic regulators impact on T cell differentiation. My goal is to design an ideal CD8 T cell population for adoptive cell transfer that is abundant, proliferative, and maintains effector potential to provide a long-lasting anti-tumor response. As a physician scientist in the Department of Bone Marrow Transplantation and Cellular Therapy, I am building a research program to implement my findings in future cellular therapies to directly benefit patients. "