Washington University in St. Louis (WU)
The goal of my research is to optimize allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT ) for the treatment of hematopoietic malignancies by separating graft-versus-host disease (GvHD), a life-threatening complication, from a beneficial graft-versus-leukemia effect (GvL) following allo-HSCT. My primary research interest is to understand the role of IFNGR and IL6R signaling and downstream JAK-STAT in GvHD and GvL using mouse models. These include T cell trafficking to GVHD target organs, regulatory T cells, and the novel GvHD suppressor molecules, S100A8 and S100A9. My research also focuses on identifying novel genes that might differentially regulate GvHD and GvL using CRISPR/Cas9 guide RNA library screens.