Bingfei Yu, Ph.D.

Research

The Yu lab studies how immune cells, especially T cells, recognize and target threats to develop precision immunotherapies for cancer and other diseases. T cells identify threats through antigens presented on human leukocyte antigen (HLA) proteins, which help distinguish the body’s own proteins from those produced by pathogen or cancer cells. However, HLA proteins vary extensively from person to person, posing a major challenge: Current T cell-based immunotherapies are mostly designed for one HLA type and are ineffective for others, leading to disparities in treatment access and efficacy. To address this, my lab will decipher how T cells recognize HLA antigens across diverse populations, facilitating the development of broadly effective cancer immunotherapy. First, we will develop a novel antigen discovery platform to identify cancer antigens that work across HLA types from more than 90% of global populations. Then, we will determine how to program T cells to recognize these antigens. This work could help make strides toward developing universal cancer immunotherapies, with significant potential to improve global health outcomes for cancer.