Nu Zhang
University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, TX·Microbiology & Immunology
Cancer immunotherapies, which harness the immune system to attack tumors, have transformed care for some patients. Yet only a minority of patients see lasting benefit.
- Fields
Microbiology & Immunology
Medicine & Clinical Research
- Topics
CD8+ T cells
stem-like T cells
Tcf-1
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Dec 2028
What they work on
- Determine how TRM-stem cells, Tcf-1+ stem-like CD8+ T cells that become resident in tumor-draining lymph nodes, are related to other T cell subsets there, by tracking tumor-specific T cells in mouse tumor models.
- Test whether TRM-stem cells in tumor-draining lymph nodes are connected to the stem-like T cells found inside the tumor microenvironment, with and without tumor vaccination.
- Test whether manipulating the lymphoid residency program of stem-like T cells can release them from lymph nodes and boost tumor vaccine responses in mice.
More about the research
Much of the anti-tumor response depends on a small group of 'stem-like' T cells. These are killer immune cells with memory-like features that can renew themselves and keep the attack going, and they are the main responders to several current therapies. Understanding what limits these cells could point to ways to make treatments such as tumor vaccines work for more people.
Why it matters
Most cancer patients do not gain lasting benefit from current immunotherapies. Learning why stem-like T cells become trapped in lymph nodes could reveal a new target, the residency program in tumor-draining lymph nodes, for making tumor vaccines more effective. This knowledge could lay the groundwork for better vaccine-based immunotherapies for people with cancer.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Ananda W Goldrath
University of California-San Diego, CA·Microbiology & Immunology
Define how the transcriptional repressor Hic1 regulates the formation and maintenance of tissue-resident memory CD8 T cells, and identify the infection-induced signals that turn Hic1 on.
Jin Xie
University of Georgia, GA·Biomedical Engineering
Test whether anti-CD205 antibody-conjugated calcium nanoparticles (αCaNPs) selectively raise cytosolic calcium in circulating cDC1 dendritic cells and increase their infiltration into tumors in murine head and neck cancer models.
Hussein Sultan
Washington University in St Louis, MO·Microbiology & Immunology
Determine how the EBI3 subunit of the suppressive cytokine IL-35 drives induction of Tr1 regulatory CD4 T cells, using IL-35 reporter mice in established tumor models to identify which cells produce it.
The school
University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio: 15 labs on PI Pages, $313M a year on research, 149 research doctorates a year.
More about University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio
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