Tori Yamamoto, PhD

Post-doctoral Fellow
Alex Marson Laboratory
University of California, San Francisco


Education

BA Biochemistry, Whitman College, Walla Walla, WA, USA

PhD Immunology, University of Pennsylvania, 2019 (Mentor: Dr. Nicholas Restifo, NCI)

Thesis

Tori engineered CD8+ T cells that were able to overcome death signaling within tumor environment. Such engineered CD8+ T cells exhibited enhanced persistence within tumors, resulting in superior cancer regression and overall survival.

Publications From Graduate Work

  • Yamamoto TN, Kishton RJ, Restifo NP. Developing neoantigen-targeted T cell-based treatments for solid tumors. Nat Med. 25(10):1488-1499. 2019.
  • Lee PH, Yamamoto TN, Gurusamy D, Sukumar M, Yu Z, Hu-Li J, Kawabe T, Gangaplara A, Kishton RJ, Henning AN, Vodnala SK, Germain RN, Paul WE, Restifo NP. Host conditioning with IL-1β improves the antitumor function of adoptively transferred T cells. J Exp Med. 216(11):2619-2634. 2019
  • Kanellopoulou C, George AB, Masutani E, Cannons JL, Ravell JC, Yamamoto TN, Smelkinson MG, Jiang PD, Matsuda-Lennikov M, Reilley J, Handon R, Lee PH, Miller  JR, Restifo NP, Zheng L, Schwartzberg PL, Young M, Lenardo MJ. Mg(2+) regulation  of kinase signaling and immune function. J Exp Med. 216(8):1828-1842. 2019
  • Vodnala SK, Eil R, Kishton RJ, Sukumar M, Yamamoto TN, Ha NH, Lee PH, Shin M, Patel SJ, Yu Z, Palmer DC, Kruhlak MJ, Liu X, Locasale JW, Huang J, Roychoudhuri R, Finkel T, Klebanoff CA, Restifo NP. T cell stemness and dysfunction in tumors are triggered by a common mechanism. Science. 363(6434). pii: eaau0135. 2019
  • Yamamoto TN, Lee PH, Vodnala SK, Gurusamy D, Kishton RJ, Yu Z, Eidizadeh A, Eil R, Fioravanti J, Gattinoni L, Kochenderfer JN, Fry TJ, Aksoy BA, Hammerbacher JE, Cruz AC, Siegel RM, Restifo NP, Klebanoff CA. T cells genetically engineered  to overcome death signaling enhance adoptive cancer immunotherapy. J Clin Invest. 129(4):1551-1565. 2019.
  • Klebanoff CA, Crompton JG, Leonardi AJ, Yamamoto TN, Chandran SS, Eil RL, Sukumar M, Vodnala SK, Hu J, Ji Y, Clever D, Black MA, Gurusamy D, Kruhlak MJ, Jin P, Stroncek DF, Gattinoni L, Feldman SA, Restifo NP. Inhibition of AKT signaling uncouples T cell differentiation from expansion for receptor-engineered adoptive immunotherapy. JCI Insight.2(23). pii: 95103. 2017.
  • Williams CM, Schonnesen AA, Zhang SQ, Ma KY, He C, Yamamoto T, Eckhardt SG, Klebanoff CA, Jiang N. Normalized Synergy Predicts That CD8 Co-Receptor Contribution to T Cell Receptor (TCR) and pMHC Binding Decreases As TCR Affinity Increases in Human Viral-Specific T Cells. Front Immunol. 8:894. 2017
  • Patel SJ, Sanjana NE, Kishton RJ, Eidizadeh A, Vodnala SK, Cam M, Gartner JJ,  Jia L, Steinberg SM, Yamamoto TN, Merchant AS, Mehta GU, Chichura A, Shalem O, Tran E, Eil R, Sukumar M, Guijarro EP, Day CP, Robbins P, Feldman S, Merlino G, Zhang F, Restifo NP. Identification of essential genes for cancer immunotherapy. Nature. 548(7669):537-542. 2017.
  • Cruz AC, Ramaswamy M, Ouyang C, Klebanoff CA, Sengupta P, Yamamoto TN, Meylan F, Thomas SK, Richoz N, Eil R, Price S, Casellas R, Rao VK, Lippincott-Schwartz J, Restifo NP, Siegel RM. Fas/CD95 prevents autoimmunity independently of lipid raft localization and efficient apoptosis induction. Nat Commun. 7:13895. 2016.