Harvey and Kate Cushing Professor of Medicine (Oncology) and of Dermatology; Director, Yale SPORE in Skin Cancer, Yale Cancer Center; Vice Chair for Collaborative Research, Internal Medicine; Chief, Division of Skin and Kidney Cancer; Associate Cancer Center Director, Education, Training and Faculty Development; Deputy Section Chief, Medical Oncology
Yale Cancer Center K12 Calabresi Immuno-Oncology Training Program (IOTP)
The Yale Cancer Center (YCC) K12 Calabresi Immuno-Oncology Training Program (IOTP) is a program funded by NCI to address the urgent need to train junior investigators to conduct patient-oriented cancer immunology and immunotherapy studies to accelerate the pace of these advances. IOTP trains both PhD and MD or MD/PhD junior faculty in clinically-relevant immuno-oncology and translational immunology. IOTP capitalizes on the wealth of expertise at Yale in immunobiology and immunotherapy. IOTP faculty have extensive track records of mentorship and are actively pursuing research in these areas. IOTP is supported by YCC and synergizes with the Yale Center for Clinical Investigation (YCCI), which provides some foundational courses. The training program includes didactic and practical training developed specifically for IOTP. The two-year curriculum includes courses on basic immunology and cancer immunology, immunotherapy-specific clinical trial design, the Cancer Immunology Forum and an individually tailored, two-year translational immuno-oncology research project encompassing both laboratory and clinical research. A panel of mentors including both a basic and clinical faculty member will be appointed for each Scholar (junior faculty.) Junior faculty within five years of appointment as faculty will be eligible to apply to IOTP, with up to five scholars appointed at any one time. Consistent with campus-wide efforts to encourage diversity, a Recruitment & Diversity Subcommittee is charged with maximizing diversity of the Scholar population. The program is led by an Executive Committee comprised of the PI (Dr. Harriet Kluger, YCC Associate Cancer Center Director for Education, Training, and Faculty Development) and two Co-Directors with complementary expertise (Drs. Akiko Iwasaki, and Alessandro Santin, Leader of the Gynecologic Oncology Research Team.) In summary, the IOTP draws upon an area of profound institutional strength and enable Yale Cancer Center to focus specifically on cross-disciplinary training of scholars in Cancer Immunotherapy, a field in great need of well-trained basic and clinical scientists to accommodate its explosive growth.
The two-year IOTP Scholar Award is open for application from August to December of each year and training starts on March 1st of the following year. Successful applicants are required to demonstrate a strong commitment to a career in cancer immunology. Recipients will be funded for up to 75% effort. Applicants are required to identify a mentor and a provide a research and mentorship proposal. Application deadline is June 14, 2024 at 5 pm.
For additional information and questions, please contact: Meina Wang, PhD (meina.wang@yale.edu) or Harriet Kluger, MD (harriet.kluger@yale.edu).
Application Instructions for 2024 K12 Immuno-Oncology Training Program (IOTP) Scholar Awards
Applications for Yale Cancer Center K12 Immuno-Oncology Training Program (IOTP) Scholar Awards
Mentorship
All Scholars will be provided both basic research and immunotherapy clinical trials experiences. Given that mentorship is critical to the success of our scholars, each scholar will have a team comprised of three mentors: a practicing physician in an oncologic discipline, a research scientist with expertise in immunobiology and a member of the Executive Committee with expertise aligned with the project. It is expected that one of the mentors will interact most closely with the Scholar and will be considered the primary mentor. We have carefully selected a diverse pool of 22 faculty who will serve as primary or secondary mentors.
Curriculum
The curriculum includes courses on basic immunology and cancer immunology, immunotherapy-specific clinical trial design, the Cancer Immunology Forum and an individually tailored, two-year translational immuno-oncology research project encompassing both laboratory and clinical research. Scholars who have already obtained extensive training in any of the areas covered by the courses will be exempt; these exemptions will be provided on an individual basis, and an individual training plan (ITP) will be approved for each scholar.
Resources
Award Opportunities
- Yale Cancer Center K12 Calabresi Immuno-Oncology Training Program Scholar Awards
- Women and URM Recruitment
IOTP is committed to maintaining a diverse trainee and mentor environment, and trainees from groups under-represented in Medicine (URIM) and women will particularly be encouraged to apply and a concerted effort will be made to recruit women and URIM Scholars. We will strive to provide URIM Scholars with role models and Mentors and give Scholars opportunities to network with these faculty and with one another. Efforts to engage minorities will be further coordinated with women and URIM mentors from our mentorship panel.
Leadership
Sterling Professor of Immunobiology and Professor of Dermatology and of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology and of Epidemiology (Microbial Diseases); Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, (HHMI)
Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences; Clinical Research Team Leader, Gynecologic Oncology, Yale Cancer Center; Co-Chief, Section of Gynecologic Oncology
Professor of Pathology; Vice Chair for Basic and Translational Sciences, Pathology; Associate Cancer Center Director, Shared Resources
2020-2022 Scholars
Associate Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology); Co-Director, Colorectal Program in the Center for Gastrointestinal Cancers; Medical Oncology Section Lead for National Accreditation Program for Rectal Cancer, Internal Medicine; Co-Director, GI Clinical Research Team
Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology)
Dr. Tran is an Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) and cares for patients with melanoma and other advanced skin cancers at the Smilow Cancer Hospital in New Haven and in Smilow Guilford. She participated in the ABIM Physician-Scientist Research Pathway and completed both her internal medicine residency and hematology/oncology clinical fellowship at Yale. She received her MD and PhD degrees from Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. Dr. Tran is actively engaged in translational research in melanoma brain metastases and developing novel therapeutics and drug combinations to improve responses in melanoma and overcome immune resistance. She has been funded through the Yale Cancer Center T32, the YCC K12 Calabresi Immuno-Oncology Training Program (IOTP), and the Skin Cancer SPORE career enhancement program. Dr. Tran is the principal investigator of several clinical trials in melanoma.
2019-2021 Scholars
Assistant Professor
Grace Chen received her undergraduate training in the College of Chemistry at UC Berkeley. She attended Harvard University for her PhD where she worked in David Liu's laboratory to discover and characterize novel RNA modifications. Her postdoctoral research was at Stanford University in Howard Chang's group, where she investigated circular RNA immunity. Grace joined Yale University as a faculty in the Department of Immunobiology in 2019. Her research focuses on the functions and regulations of circular RNAs and RNA modifications in health and disease.Assistant Professor of Surgery (Oncology); Leader, Skin Cancer Surgery, Melanoma Program; Clinical Director of the Smilow Melanoma Program, Yale Cancer Center; Co-Director Cutaneous Malignancy Tumor Board, Yale Cancer Center; Medical Student Clerkship Liaison for Division of Surgical Oncology, Surgery
Kelly Olino, MD, FACS, is a doubly board -certified surgeon who provides patients with comprehensive surgical care including resection of skin and soft tissue tumors including melanoma, merkel cell carcinoma, sarcoma, and advanced cutaneous squamous cell and basal cell carcinoma, including minimally invasive techniques for metastatic disease. Dr. Olino is a past recipient of the Society for Surgical Oncology’s Clinical Investigator Award to support her research in tumor immunology. She continues this work at Yale and has been funded through the Calabresi Immune-Oncology scholar program and the Skin Cancer SPORE career enhancement program. She continues her work in translational research combining her knowledge of tumor immunology with her clinical acumen. She currently serves on the NCCN non-melanoma cutaneous malignancy committee. Learn more about Dr. Olino>>Assistant Professor of Pediatrics (Hematology/Oncology); Associate Program Director, Pediatrics Hematology/Oncology Fellowship, Pediatrics