Researcher Spotlight: Jennifer Snyder-Cappione

OCRI member Dr. Jennifer Snyder-Cappione is a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Associate Director of the Center for Immunobiology, and Director of the Flow Cytometry Core Facility at Boston University School of Medicine.  Dr. Snyder-Cappione and her team investigate the progression of immune cell subsets into exhausted (checkpoint-inhibited) states in a variety of chronic diseases, including HIV, systemic scleroderma, and oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). She works to improve ex vivo methodologies to help determine the functional interchanges between cell subsets in vivo that dictate the fate of a diseased site and surrounding areas, and to clarify the steps of immune cell exhaustion, a reversible state that occurs in many chronic diseases.

Clinical trials of agents that target the PD-1/PD-1L inhibitory receptor (IR) axis in cancer patients, including those with OSCC, have generated impressive results in recent years, with some patients exhibiting 100% tumor reduction. To help elucidate immune exhaustion pathways, Dr. Snyder-Cappione’s group has developed an 18-parameter (16-color) flow cytometry panel that measures combinational signatures of the IRs PD-1, TIGIT, CD160, TIM-3, and LAG-3 on multiple immune cell subsets (CD4+ T, CD8+ T, gd T, iNKT, and NK cells) with single cell resolution. This research could provide insight into the immunological alterations (including exhaustion processes) that result in the disabling of anti-tumor effector functions of immune cell subsets in OSCC patients, which in turn will enable the development of more targeted and effective therapeutics.