Dr. Hyun-Sung Lee Awarded Funding for Checkpoint Immuno-therapy Study

Dr. Hyun-Sung Lee has been awarded an industry-sponsored research grant of $1.94M, over the course of three years, from Samyang Biopharm USA. The goal with this funding is to investigate and study the role of anti-MIC (MHC Class I Chain-Related Protein) antibody in overcoming resistance to checkpoint immunotherapy by targeting MIC-NKG2D (a receptor on natural killer cells and cytotoxic T cells) through systems onco-immunology approach. This investigation will lay a solid foundation for future clinical trials.

This year Dr. Lee has launched the Systems Onco-Immunology Laboratory (SOIL) in the Division of General Thoracic Surgery to investigate cancer-immune system networks through the integration of state-of-the-art single-cell platforms and inform the design of novel approaches to immunotherapy. The SOIL hopes to use single-cell multi-omics data and biospecimen samples from multiple cohorts to help predict response/resistance and immunotoxicities to immunotherapy before or during treatment, allowing patients to have the precision immunotherapy. The SOIL is a hub for translational oncology research projects and unites an interdisciplinary team of surgeons, medical oncologists, immunologists, bioinformaticians, and biostatisticians who are conducting research in the field of onco-immunology.