Research Summary
Current Non-NIH Awards:
TR3-05535 Cowan (PI) 11/01/2012-10/31/2015
California Institute of Regenerative Medicine vGene Correction of Autologous Hematopoietic Stem Cells in Artemis Deficient SCID
Goal is to complete the preclinical testing necessary for a clinical gene therapy trial in children with Artemis-SCID. The focus is on optimizing non-chemotherapy approaches to opening marrow niches, studying potential genotoxicity, and demonstrating that gene transduced Artemis deficient hematopoietic stem cells mature in vitro and in vivo into T and B cells.
Role: PI
DR2A-05365 Shizuru (PI) 07/01/2013-06/30/2017
California Institute of Regenerative Medicine vA monoclonal antibody that depletes blood stem cells and enables chemotherapy free transplants
Goal is to bring to a clinical trial a monoclonal antibody that targets hematopoietic stem cells. The antibody will be evaluated in a non-human primate model followed by a prospective phase I/II clinical trial in children with SCID.
Role: Co-PI
Overview:
I am a pediatric immunologist, Professor of Pediatrics and Chief, Allergy Immunology and BMT Division at UCSF. I led the planning for what ultimately became the Primary Immune Deficiency Treatment Consortium (PIDTC), an NIH-funded group of 43 centers in the US and Canada focused on PID in which I am the PI and UCSF is the lead institution since 2009. I am on the Steering and Executive Committees of the Pediatric Blood and Marrow Transplant Consortium (PBMTC) and established and led for three years the Pediatric Special Interest Group within the American Society of Blood and Marrow Transplantation. My career has focused on children with PID, with over 180 peer-reviewed publications. My major research interests include SCID in Athabascan-speaking Native Americans (SCIDA), gene therapy for children with Artemis-deficient SCID, non-chemotherapy approaches to opening marrow niches, and the use of haploidentical donors and reduced-toxicity transplantation for childhood diseases. I performed one of the initial haplocompatible T cell depleted marrow transplants for SCID in North America in 1982 and reported one of the first in utero transplants in the world, the first patient with multiple biotin-dependent carboxylase deficiencies and immune deficiency, and the first children with HIV infection. I have treated the largest cohort of children with SCIDA and the largest number of babies diagnosed through newborn screening with SCID in North America, mapped the genetic locus of the gene for SCIDA and radiation sensitive SCID (RS-SCID), and identified the mutation in DCLRE1C responsible for SCIDA in Navajo and Apache children. I designed and completed one of the few prospective single institution trials of haplocompatible HCT for children with SCID and initiated and completed the first large study of children with SCID transplanted in North America and reported by the PIDTC.
Research Funding
September 12, 2009 - August 31, 2024 - Primary Immune Deficiency Treatment Consortium, Principal Investigator. Sponsor: NIH/NIAID, Sponsor Award ID: U54AI082973
March 2, 2011 - February 29, 2020 - Annual Primary Immune Deficiency Treatment Consortium (PIDTC) Workshop and Education Day, Co-Principal Investigator. Sponsor: NIH/NIAID, Sponsor Award ID: R13AI094943
March 1, 1982 - May 31, 2015 - Bio-Organic Biomedical Mass Spectrometry Resource, Co-Investigator. Sponsor: NIH, Sponsor Award ID: P41RR001614
June 1, 1975 - April 30, 2015 - California National Primate Research Center, Co-Investigator. Sponsor: NIH, Sponsor Award ID: P51RR000169
Education
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, B.S., 1966, Electrical Engineering
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, M.D., 1970, Medicine
University of California, San Francisco, Intern/Resident, 1975-77, Pediatrics
University of California, San Francisco, Fellow, 1977-79, Immunology