Emerging Cell Therapies (K2)
February 1-4, 2026
| Fairmont Banff Springs, Banff, AB, Canada
Wendell A. Lim, Ashley K. Koegel and Robbie G. Majzner
Scholarship Deadline: Oct. 29, 2025 | Abstract Deadline: Jan. 9, 2026 | Early Registration Deadline: Dec. 3, 2025
| 4:00–8:00 PM |
Registration |
Riverview Lounge |
| 6:00–8:00 PM |
Welcome Mixer |
Riverview Lounge |
| 7:00–8:00 AM |
Breakfast |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 8:00–8:10 AM |
Welcome Remarks |
Alhambra Ballroom |
| 8:10–9:00 AM |
Keynote Address |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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* Wendell A. Lim, University of California, San Francisco
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Georg A Schett, Uniklinikum Erlangen
Cell Therapies for Lupus |
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| 9:00–11:15 AM |
New Cell Types for Therapy |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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* Wendell A. Lim, University of California, San Francisco
Session Chair |
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Nicholas Arpaia, Columbia University Irving Medical Center
Engineered Probiotic Bacteria for Cancer Immunotherapy |
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Yiyin Erin Chen, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard
Skin Microbiota to Manipulate Immune Responses |
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Frederick Bennett, University of Pennsylvania
Microglia Replacement |
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Abbas Ghaddar, Rice University
Short Talk: Engineering N-lactoyl Phenylalanine Producing Bacteria for the Treatment of Obesity |
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| 9:30–9:50 AM |
Coffee Break |
Riverview Lounge |
| 11:15–1:00 PM |
Poster Setup |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 11:15–5:00 PM |
On Own for Lunch |
|
| 1:00–10:00 PM |
Poster Viewing |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 3:00–4:30 PM |
Symposia Spotlight 1 |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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* Ashley K. Koegel, Bristol Myers Squibb
Session Chair |
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Sangwoo Park, Mass General Hospital
Tuning CAR-T Cells by Targeting Cancer-Associated Glycan in Pancreatic Cancer |
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Grace Bugos, Fred Hutch Cancer Center
Sensitive Bispecific Synthetic Chimeric T cell Receptors for Cancer Therapy |
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Jennifer M Feigin, Mayo Clinic Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences
Targeting the Bone Marrow Microenvironment with CART Cell Therapy to Overcome Resistance in Multiple Myeloma |
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Filippo Birocchi, MGH
Fratricide by Design: Selective T Cell Elimination in Cancer Therapy |
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Devan Shah, UCSF
Engineering synthetic multi-cell immune circuits |
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| 4:30–5:00 PM |
Coffee Available |
Riverview Lounge |
| 5:00–7:00 PM |
Cell Therapies for Autoimmunity and Inflammation |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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* Ashley K. Koegel, Bristol Myers Squibb
Autoimmune Cell Therapies |
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Gilles Besin, Orbital Therapeutics
Advancing In Vivo RNA Therapies Towards Clinical in B-Cell-Mediated Autoimmune Diseases |
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* Megan K. Levings, University of British Columbia
CAR Tregs |
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Aaron G Winters, A2 Biotherapeutics
Short Talk: Discerning Friend from Foe in Autoimmunity: NOT Gate Cell Tmod™ Therapy Discriminates Pathogenic vs. Non-Pathogenic Lymphocytes |
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Rotem Shalita, Weizmann Institute of Science
Short Talk: Reprogramming Neuroinflammation: Data-Guided Development of a PD-1 CAR T Platform for Multiple Sclerosis |
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| 7:00–8:00 PM |
Social Hour with Dinner |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 7:30–10:00 PM |
Poster Session 1 |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
Tuesday, February 3, 2026
| 7:00–8:00 AM |
Breakfast |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 8:00–11:00 AM |
Foundational Synthetic Biology Tools for Cell Engineering |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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* Wendell A. Lim, University of California, San Francisco
Cells as Integrators of Complex Functions |
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Diego Vargas, Link Cell Therapies
LNK001 - Logic-Gated CAR-T cells for Treatment of Clear Cell Renal Cell Carcinoma |
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* Adrian Bot, ex-Capstan Therapeutics
In vivo Immune Engineering Paves the Way Towards a New Therapeutic Modality |
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Xiaojing Gao, Stanford University
Biomolecular Circuits as Medicine |
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Jeremy R Bjelajac, Stanford University
Short Talk: Cell Autonomous Control of CAR Signaling and Receptor Shedding via ADAM17 Mediated Proteolysis |
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Hersh K Bhargava, UCSF Cell Design Institute
Short Talk: Engineering Cell Autonomous IL-2 Circuits to Understand and Control T Cell Responses |
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| 9:00–9:20 AM |
Coffee Break |
Riverview Lounge |
| 9:20–9:25 AM |
Award Recipient Acknowledgement |
Alhambra Ballroom |
| 11:00–1:00 PM |
Poster Setup |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 11:00–5:00 PM |
On Own for Lunch |
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| 1:00–10:00 PM |
Poster Viewing |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 1:45–2:45 PM |
Career Roundtable (Joint) |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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Samuel T Haile, Kite Pharma
Director |
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Marc-André Langlois, University of Ottawa
Professor |
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Andrew McGuire, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center
Associate Professor |
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Rianne van der Windt, Genmab
Senior Scientist |
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| 3:00–4:30 PM |
Panel Discussion: Regulatory Hurdles for Cell Therapies |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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* Kristen Hege, Independent board member, Adaptimmune, Mersana, Kelonia, KSQ, EvolveImmune.
Panel Moderator |
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Marcela V Maus, Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center
Panelist |
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Andras Heczey, Seattle Children's Research Institute
Panelist |
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Adrian Bot, ex-Capstan Therapeutics
Panelist |
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Robbie G. Majzner, Dana Farber Cancer Institute
Panelist |
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Ashley K. Koegel, Bristol Myers Squibb
Panelist |
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Georg A Schett, Uniklinikum Erlangen
Panelist |
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| 4:00–5:00 PM |
Coffee Break with Hot Chocolate, Firepits & Mountain Views |
Conservatory Terrace |
| 5:00–7:00 PM |
Cancer Cell Therapies: Preclinical |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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* Ruth Salmon, BMS
Session Chair |
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* Robbie G. Majzner, Dana Farber Cancer Institute
Cancer Cell Therapy |
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Mark Yarmarkovich, New York University
Peptide Centric CARs |
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Caroline Whitty, University of California, San Francisco
Short Talk: Stromal-directed Synthetic CAR T Circuits Effectively Treat Solid Tumors and Protect against On-target Off-tumor Toxicity |
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Misty R. Jenkins, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research
Short Talk: EphA3-targeted Chimeric Antigen Receptor T Cells are Effective in Glioma and Generate Curative Memory T Cell Responses |
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Charlotte Wang, UCSF
Short Talk: Site Saturation Mutagenesis of ZAP70 Enables Rational CAR-T Cell Optimization |
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Mitchell Kluesner, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Short Talk: ChTCR-T Cells Overcome Low Antigen Density in Solid Tumors |
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| 7:00–8:00 PM |
Social Hour with Dinner |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 7:30–10:00 PM |
Poster Session 2 |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
Wednesday, February 4, 2026
| 7:00–8:00 AM |
Breakfast |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 8:00–11:15 AM |
Cancer Cell Therapies: Clinical |
Alhambra Ballroom |
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Claudia Rossig, University of Münster
GD2-Targeted CAR T Cell Therapies for Solid Cancers |
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* Kristen Hege, Independent board member, Adaptimmune, Mersana, Kelonia, KSQ, EvolveImmune.
GART Lessons Learned Guiding Next Gen Cell Therapies |
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* Marcela V Maus, Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center
Cell Therapies for Glioblastoma and Beyond |
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Andras Heczey, Seattle Children's Research Institute
GPC3-CAR T Cells for Patients with Solid Tumors |
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Jennifer L Clarke, UCSF
Preliminary Results from a Phase 1 Study of Autologous Anti-EGFRvIII SynNotch Receptor-Induced Anti-EphA2/Il-13Rα2 CAR (E-SYNC) T-Cells in Adult Participants with EGFRvIII+ Glioblastoma |
|
| 9:00–9:20 AM |
Coffee Break |
Riverview Lounge |
| 11:15–5:00 PM |
On Own for Lunch |
|
| 2:30–4:30 PM |
Symposia Spotlight 2 |
Alhambra Ballroom |
| |
* Robbie G. Majzner, Dana Farber Cancer Institute
Session Chair |
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Lauren Durland, University of British Columbia
Optimizing Progenitor Dynamics Enables Efficient CD4 and CD8 T Cell Production from Human Pluripotent Stem Cells |
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Katherine A Freitas, Kite Pharma
Immune Synapse Disruption and Reduction of MHC Expression by Base Editing Protects Allogeneic CAR T Cells from Immune Rejection |
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Tim Guo, GentiBio, Inc
Robust Immune Evasion Technology Enables Durable Persistence of Allogeneic Engineered Regulatory T Cells |
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Kylie A Burdsall, Stanford Medicine
In Vivo CAR-T cell Engineering with the PACK-IT Platform Generates Il9-Receptor Expressing CAR-T cells with Potent Anti-Tumor Efficacy |
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Milos Simic, University of Chicago
Programming Tissue-Sensing T Cells to Deliver Therapies to the Brain |
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Kunal Rai, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
Precision Epigenome Engineering to Improve T Cell Therapy |
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Geoffrey Rouin, University of Pennsylvania
A Novel CRISPR Screening Approach Identifies Targets for Reversal of Human CAR T Cell Exhaustion |
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Wan Sang Cho, Stanford University
A Continuous Landscape of Signaling Encodes a Corresponding Landscape of CAR T Cell Phenotype |
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| 4:30–5:00 PM |
Coffee Available |
Riverview Lounge |
| 5:00–6:30 PM |
Cell Therapies for Regeneration |
Alhambra Ballroom |
| |
Stefan Irion, BlueRock Therapeutics
Cell Therapy for Neurodegenerative Disease |
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* Faranak Fattahi, University of California, San Francisco
Peripheral Nerve Regeneration |
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* Jacob H Hanna, Weizmann Institute of Science
Utilizing Synthetic Embryo Models for Enhanced Stem Cell Differentiation |
|
| 6:30–6:45 PM |
Meeting Wrap-Up: Outcomes and Future Directions (Organizers) |
Alhambra Ballroom |
| 7:00–8:00 PM |
Social Hour with Dinner |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 8:15–9:15 PM |
Cash Bar |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
| 8:15–9:15 PM |
Entertainment |
Alberta/New Brunswick |
Thursday, February 5, 2026
