Cassian Yee

Cancer immunotherapy, the use of the immune system to combat cancer, is a rapidly emerging field of research that has recently gained foothold in the clinic as a treatment modality. My laboratory works on the development of immunotherapies for the treatment of cancer, in particular adoptive T-cell therapy. Adoptive T-cell therapy involves the isolation of T-cells from the peripheral blood, followed by enrichment and expansion of tumor-reactive T-cells for infusion into patients with cancer. We performed several first-in-man studies using ex-vivo expanded antigen-specific T-cells that demonstrated long-term persistence of infused T-cells with encouraging clinical results, sometimes complete long-lasting responses, and more often a significant delay in time to progression. Our research is focused on developing adoptive T-cell therapy in combination with other immunomodulatory reagents including checkpoint inhibitors, vaccines and biological as a treatment option, and defining the intrinsic and extrinsic immune parameters for an effective, durable response. Basic science research in the lab encompasses the fields of T cells, Tumor Immunity, Immunotherapy, Lymphocyte biology.