Alex Y. C. Huang, MD, PhD

Alex Y. C. Huang, MD, PhD

Modulation of Immune Cell Homing and Interaction by Mesenchymal Stem Cell within CNS Tumor Microenvironment

Cancer cells manage to evade detection and elimination by the immune system whose job is to recognize and eliminate the threat of foreign invaders and cancer cells in the body. Dr. Huang’s laboratory proposes to take advantage of a unique imaging tool, the intravital 2-photon laser scanning microscopy, to directly observe in real time how brain tumor cells hijack various immune-suppressive components of the immune system and stem cell pool to evade immune detection. Success in this effort to understand how cancer cells and immune system communicate with one another in the tumor-bearing host will promise to accelerate development of novel therapeutic approaches to anti-tumor immunotherapy.