Overview

As the Director of both the Brain Tumor Immunotherapy Program and the Center for Brain and Spine Metastasis at Duke University, I focus our programmatic interests on the design, optimization, and monitoring of immune-based treatment platforms for patients with intracranial tumors, whether primary or metastatic. Within this broad scope, however, my own group looks more specifically at limitations to immunotherapeutic success, with a particular focus on understanding and reversing T cell dysfunction in patients with glioblastoma (GBM) and brain metastases. We employ a systematic approach to categorizing T cell dysfunction (Woroniecka et al, Clin Cancer Res 2018 Aug 15;24(16):3792-3802), and whereas our earlier work addressed concerns for regulatory T cell-induced tolerance, we now heavily study T cell ignorance and exhaustion, as well. Regarding the former, we recently published the novel phenomenon of S1P1-mediated bone marrow T cell sequestration in patients with intracranial tumors (Chongsathidkiet et al, Nat Medicine 2018 Sep;24(9):1459-1468). Regarding the latter, we have likewise recently identified and characterized exhaustion as a significant limitation to T-cell function within GBM (Woroniecka et al, Clin Cancer Res 2018 Sep 1;24(17):4175-4186). I very much look to collaboratively integrate our approaches with others investigating innovative treatment options. I continue my focus on combining strategies for reversing T cell deficits with current and novel immune-based platforms as a means of deriving and improving rational and precise anti-tumor therapies. It is my sincerest desire to forge a career focused on co-operative, multi-disciplinary, organized brain tumor therapy. Ultimately, my goal is to help coordinate the efforts of a streamlined and effective center for brain tumor research and clinical care. I hope to play some role in ushering in a period where the science and treatment arms of brain tumor therapy suffer no disjoint, but instead represent the convergent efforts of researchers, neuro-oncologists, medical oncologists, radiation oncologists, biomedical engineers, and neurosurgeons alike. I hope to see such synergy become standard of care.

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