Bao Lab

Research focus

NIH R01 · 2024

Immune Exclusion in Cancer Immunotherapy

ABSTRACT Most patients with solid tumors do not benefit from immune-checkpoint inhibition, emphasizing the need to improve immunotherapy. We have demonstrated that the T cell-inflamed tumor microenvironment (TME), characterized by CD8+ T cells and type I/II interferon (IFN) gene expression, is an important cancer immunotherapy biomarker. Tumor mutational burden may also dictate response with some oncogenic pathways, such as WNT/β-catenin, known to mediate immune-exclusion and drive the non-T cell-inflamed TME. Our research group has nominated a core group of molecular targets associated with immune-exclusion centered at p38 MAPK. p38 is known to regulate macrophages and dendritic cells.…

From the public funding record at NIH RePORTER. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.