Vannini Lab members

Research interest 

I’m interested in understanding how the metabolism of T cells changes during ageing. In particular, I aim to investigate why aged T cells provide deficient anti-tumor responses and find metabolic mechanisms that could provide novel targets for immunotherapy. 

Background

I obtained my PhD from the University of Leeds, working at the Leeds Institute for Medical Research (LIMR), UK where I characterised how environmental cues influenced CD8 T cell function and metabolism.

PhD student CONTACT ME

Research interest

HSCs assure the homeostasis between myeloid and lymphoid lineages. However, this balance would be disrupted with age as aged HSCs are myeloid-biased skewing. Therefore, my project aims to identify metabolic strategies to preserve the balanced immune system in elderly people. 

Background

I earned a master’s degree after graduating from the Institute of Biopharmaceutical Sciences in Nation Yang-Ming University, Taiwan. 

Research interest 

My research focus is on pharmacological rejuvenation of aged hematopoietic stem cells by restoration of mitochondrial fitness and alternative diverse MOAs. Key tasks include but are not limited to scalable assay development, long-term transplantations, human stem cell cultures and bioinformatics. 

Background

Up until now I worked over 14 years on hematopoietic stem cell biology, exploring hemato-immunologic tissues from 7 different species. My PhD thesis at the Klusmann lab in Hannover Medical School, Germany, was directly followed by postdoctoral studies in the same lab, to compile the transcriptional landscape of non-coding RNAs across normal and malignant human hematopoiesis, which was awarded by the Annual Society of Hematology (ASH). For a second post-doc I joined Vera Gorbunovas lab at University of Rochester, USA, through a long-term fellowship from the Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP). There I pioneered and established gold standards from clinical hematology such as blood counts, stem cell purifications, transplantations, ex vivo culture and lentiviral transductions in long-lived, cancer resistent naked mole-rats, a non-standard mammalian model organism of healthy longevity. Shortly after I received an Impetus grant before I joined Nicola Vannini's lab in March 2023.

Postdoctoral researcher CONTACT ME

Research interest

I’m interested in immunometabolism and my projects are focused in finding nutritional approaches to improve current immunotherapy strategies.

Background

PhD in Molecular Life Science (EDMS) in the laboratory of Pr D. Constam, at EPFL, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne.