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Recipient: Stosh Ozog, MD, PhD, pediatric hematology/oncology fellow, Fred Hutch Cancer Center, University of Washington, Seattle Children’s Hospital
Project title of research award: Paired T cell Receptor Sequencing to Profile T cell Dynamics after HCT
What does this recognition mean to you?
“I am humbled and excited to receive this award, which recognizes our collaborative work with the Paul Thomas and David Koelle labs. I am also tremendously thankful to my mentorship team, Drs. Joshua Hill and Marie Bleakley, whose guidance has been critical for developing this work. This award reflects interest within the ASTCT community in applying paired T-cell receptor sequencing to better define immune reconstitution after hematopoietic cell transplantation. This recognition is motivating as we work toward tailored immune-informed approaches to reduce post-transplant complications and improve outcomes.”
How will this award facilitate your ongoing work?
“The ASTCT New Investigator Award will provide critical support to establish the foundational studies needed to characterize T-cell dynamics following hematopoietic cell transplantation. These data will inform future translational efforts aimed at leveraging immune repertoire features to guide post-transplant risk stratification and therapeutic decision-making.”
How did you first become interested in transplantation and cellular and gene therapy?
“My interest began during medical school with early exposure to cellular therapy concepts during pre-clinical years and deepened during my PhD work on gene therapy and hematopoietic stem cell engineering. Now as I care for pediatric patients undergoing transplantation and cellular therapy, it has only reinforced the need for a deeper mechanistic understanding of immune recovery to improve outcomes and reduce the burden of the devastating diseases we treat.”
How do you hope your work influences the field?
“I hope this work advances a more precise understanding of immune reconstitution after transplantation, enabling identification of patient-specific immune vulnerabilities. Knowing prior to transplant how best to protect each unique patient, I think, would be really useful to our field. I hope the data we are generating also becomes a resource for the whole community, as up until now it has been very hard to pair T-cell receptor sequences on a large scale, thus missing a great deal of the picture of how the immune system recovers after transplant. Ultimately, I hope this work could support more tailored transplant strategies to reduce infectious complications, graft-versus-host disease and relapse.”
What excites you most about the future developments in the field of transplantation and cellular and gene therapy?
“I am excited by the integration of high-dimensional immune profiling into clinical transplantation and cellular therapy. Advances in T-cell receptor sequencing, combined with insights into host-microbiome and virome interactions, offer the potential to better predict immune outcomes and improve therapeutic precision for transplant recipients.”
The ASTCT New Investigator Awards (NIAs) are designed to encourage clinical and/or laboratory research by young investigators in the field of hematopoietic cell transplantation, cellular therapy and/or gene therapy. This includes application of these therapies to malignant diseases, both hematologic and solid tumors, non-malignant diseases, including hemoglobinopathies, immune deficiencies and autoimmune diseases. The award provides $50,000 per year for two years in support of research costs and/or salary. Visit the ASTCT website to learn more about the award.
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