News

Congratulations to the University of Melbourne’s Dr Hui-Fern Koay, an ARC DECRA Fellow at the Doherty Institute, for receiving a Contributing to Australian Scholarship and Science (CASS) Medicine/Science Grant. Her research aims to address the obstacles of current T cell immunotherapies, which are effective in treating some blood cancers but face challenges in combating solid tumours. 

The $65,000 grant will support Dr Koay in testing the utility of unique T cell subsets not traditionally adopted in immunotherapy, called unconventional T cells. The research aims to develop and test unconventional T cell-based strategies to create safer, effective, and universally applicable anti-tumour treatments for a wide range of solid cancers.  

“By leveraging the unique properties of unconventional T cells, our research has the potential to push the boundaries of cancer immunotherapy. These immune cells are abundant, naturally home to tissues and can rapidly trigger immune responses. Our goal is to explore how specifically targeting these unconventional T cells may be able to overcome the limitations faced by conventional T cell therapies,” said Dr Koay. 

“I’d like to thank the CASS Foundation for supporting this important research. This backing will enable our team to leverage our fundamental immunology expertise and tackle this proof-of-concept, towards potentially offering new hope for cancer patients with solid tumours.”  

The CASS Foundation, a philanthropic foundation established in 2001, supports and promotes the advancement of education, science and medicine, and research and practice in those fields. The competitive Medicine/Science funding is offered to Victorian medicine and science research projects which have the potential to improve understanding of key concepts and lead to improved treatment and practice.