Multidimensional Immunoengineering Approaches to Enhanced Cancer Immunotherapy
Event details
| Date | 09.03.2022 |
| Hour | 10:00 › 11:00 |
| Speaker | Prof. Li Tang, Institute of Bioengineering and Institute of Materials, School of Engineering, EPFL, Lausanne (CH) |
| Location | Online |
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
| Event Language | English |
BIOENGINEERING SEMINAR
Abstract:
Our immune system constantly interacts with invading pathogens and diseased cells in a multidimensional manner involving substantial biological, chemical, and physical exchanges. Manipulating the disease-immunity interactions may afford novel immunotherapies to better treat many diseases. My lab aims to develop novel strategies to engineer the multidimensional immunity-disease interactions (or termed ‘immunoengineering’) to create safe and effective immunotherapy against cancer. We leverage the power of metabolic and cellular bioengineering, synthetic chemistry and material engineering, and mechanical engineering to achieve controllable modulation of immune responses. In this talk, I will first describe our discovery of a new type of immune checkpoint with mechanical basis, which is distinct from known immune checkpoints of biochemical traits. We further developed a mechanical intervention to overcome the mechanical immune checkpoint for enhanced cancer immunotherapy. In the second part of my talk, I will share our recent discovery of IL-10-Fc as a metabolic reprogramming agent that reinvigorates the terminally exhausted CD8+ tumor infiltrating lymphocytes and sustains their cytotoxic functions leading to eradication of established solid tumors and durable cures in a majority of treated mice when combined with adoptive T-cell transfer immunotherapies. Finally, I will briefly talk about our efforts in chemical immunoengineering and vision for future research.
Bio:
Li Tang received his B.S. in Chemistry from Peking University, China, in 2007, and Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, in 2012, under the supervision of Prof. Jianjun Cheng. He was an CRI Irvington Postdoctoral Fellow in the laboratory of Prof. Darrell Irvine at Massachusetts Institute of Technology during 2013-2016. He joined the faculty of Institute of Bioengineering, and Institute of Materials Science & Engineering, at École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland, as a Tenure-Track Assistant Professor since 2016. His research focuses on developing multidimensional immunoengineering approaches to enhanced cancer immunotherapies. Dr. Tang is the recipient of Cancer Research Institute CLIP Award (2021), Anna Fuller Award (2021 and 2022), and named in the MIT Technology Review’s "Top 35 Innovators under Age 35" list of China region (2020), Materials Horizons Emerging Investigator (2020), Biomaterials Science Emerging Investigator (2019), recipient of European Research Council (ERC) starting grant (2018), and Nano Research Young Innovator Award (NR 45 under 45) (2018).
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Zoom link for attending remotely: https://epfl.zoom.us/j/65122053638
Abstract:
Our immune system constantly interacts with invading pathogens and diseased cells in a multidimensional manner involving substantial biological, chemical, and physical exchanges. Manipulating the disease-immunity interactions may afford novel immunotherapies to better treat many diseases. My lab aims to develop novel strategies to engineer the multidimensional immunity-disease interactions (or termed ‘immunoengineering’) to create safe and effective immunotherapy against cancer. We leverage the power of metabolic and cellular bioengineering, synthetic chemistry and material engineering, and mechanical engineering to achieve controllable modulation of immune responses. In this talk, I will first describe our discovery of a new type of immune checkpoint with mechanical basis, which is distinct from known immune checkpoints of biochemical traits. We further developed a mechanical intervention to overcome the mechanical immune checkpoint for enhanced cancer immunotherapy. In the second part of my talk, I will share our recent discovery of IL-10-Fc as a metabolic reprogramming agent that reinvigorates the terminally exhausted CD8+ tumor infiltrating lymphocytes and sustains their cytotoxic functions leading to eradication of established solid tumors and durable cures in a majority of treated mice when combined with adoptive T-cell transfer immunotherapies. Finally, I will briefly talk about our efforts in chemical immunoengineering and vision for future research.
Bio:
Li Tang received his B.S. in Chemistry from Peking University, China, in 2007, and Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, in 2012, under the supervision of Prof. Jianjun Cheng. He was an CRI Irvington Postdoctoral Fellow in the laboratory of Prof. Darrell Irvine at Massachusetts Institute of Technology during 2013-2016. He joined the faculty of Institute of Bioengineering, and Institute of Materials Science & Engineering, at École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland, as a Tenure-Track Assistant Professor since 2016. His research focuses on developing multidimensional immunoengineering approaches to enhanced cancer immunotherapies. Dr. Tang is the recipient of Cancer Research Institute CLIP Award (2021), Anna Fuller Award (2021 and 2022), and named in the MIT Technology Review’s "Top 35 Innovators under Age 35" list of China region (2020), Materials Horizons Emerging Investigator (2020), Biomaterials Science Emerging Investigator (2019), recipient of European Research Council (ERC) starting grant (2018), and Nano Research Young Innovator Award (NR 45 under 45) (2018).
.
Zoom link for attending remotely: https://epfl.zoom.us/j/65122053638
Practical information
- Informed public
- Free
Organizer
Contact
- Institute of Bioengineering (IBI), Dietrich Reinhard