Meet Our Team

Nathan Reticker-Flynn - Principal Investigator

Nate received his PhD in Biomedical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology while working with Dr. Sangeeta Bhatia as part of the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. His doctoral studies focused upon developing technologies for interrogating interactions between tumors and extracellular matrix during metastatic progression. Using mouse models of lung adenocarcinoma, his studies identified key alterations in integrin and glycosylation patterns that facilitate metastasis. He pursued his postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford University in the laboratory of Dr. Edgar Engleman, where he focused on using systems approaches and mouse models to investigate tumor-immune interactions during metastasis and responses to immunotherapies. His discoveries include the revelation that effective immunotherapies require systemic activation of anti-tumor immunity and that lymph node metastases serve to reeducate adaptive immune responses in a manner that promotes distant metastasis.
Cort Breuer - PhD Student - Immunology
Cort Breuer is originally from Boston and studied Biological Engineering at Cornell University. His work at Cornell with Esak Lee focused on lymphatic-targeted cancer therapies and mechanosensing in T cell responses. Previously, he worked with James Moon at Massachusetts General Hospital to develop in vivo gene therapies for the immune system and with Michelle Krogsgaard at NYU Perlmutter Cancer Center to investigate structural biology of TCR signaling. Cort’s current work focuses on mechanisms of tumor-immune tolerance and decoding the antigen specificity of T cell receptors. Drawing on his engineering background, he designs new molecular tools to record how immune cells communicate and constructs therapeutics to target impaired immune responses.
Markús Ísfeld Diehl - PhD Student - Immunology
Markus graduated from the University of Chicago with a degree in Molecular Engineering. His undergraduate research focused on developing imaging methodologies to study interactions between T cells, antigen-presenting cells, and cancer cells. At Stanford, Markus is co-advised by Professors Edgar Engleman and Nathan Reticker-Flynn. Broadly, Markus is interested in the intersection between the innate and adaptive immune systems in the context of cancer. His current project focuses on understanding the systemic response to metastasis initiated by a neutrophil-activating therapy first developed in the Engleman Lab.  In his free time, Markus enjoys exploring the Bay Area and California by bike and by foot, and has completed more than 2500 miles of road and trail in California.
Ryan McKillop Feitzinger - PhD Student - Cancer Biology
Ryan graduated from University of California, Davis with a B.S. in Neurobiology, Physiology and Behavior. As an undergraduate, he worked in Dr. Lucas Smith’s lab investigating the relationship between skeletal muscle mechanics and regeneration and extracellular matrix architecture. Before joining the Cancer Biology program, he also researched the impact of lipidome remodeling on neural stem cell function in the aging brain in Dr. Anne Brunet’s lab. His current project seeks to elucidate the glycoproteins that drive cancer progression and metastasis to identify novel therapeutic targets. Outside of lab, Ryan enjoys running, reading, traveling, going to concerts, and exploring breweries and restaurants with friends.
Jonathan Gagante - Research Finance Administrator 2
Norma Angelica Gutierrez - PhD Student - Immunology
Norma Angelica graduated from University of California, San Diego (UCSD) with a B.S. in Molecular and Cellular Biology. Afterwards, she spent two years at La Jolla Institute for Immunology studying myeloid immune responses to mouse and human tumors. Now, as a PhD student in the lab, her work focuses on developing novel cell therapies to disrupt antigen-specific tolerance in metastasis.
Marcos Labrado - PhD Student - Immunology
Yujung Park - PhD Student - Immunology
Yujung graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a B.S. in Bioengineering. Her undergraduate and post-grad research in the lab of Prof. David Schaffer focused on engineering oncolytic virotherapies to improve delivery in solid tumors and understanding basic mechanisms of DNA repair in poxviruses to develop novel gene-editing platforms. Her prior work includes investigating cellular factors controlling HIV latency in the lab of Prof. Iain Clark and developing CAR-NK therapies at Nkarta Inc. As a PhD student, she is interested in understanding dysfunctional immune responses that develop during the progression of cancer
Arash Saeedi - Postdoctoral Scholar
Arash completed his undergraduate studies at Sharif University of Technology, where he laid the foundation for his academic journey. He went on to pursue his Ph.D. at the University of Houston under the supervision of Dr. Navin Varadarajan. During his doctoral research, he focused on pioneering methods to enhance the delivery of non-cytotoxic proteins using engineered immune cells. He has also played a crucial role in developing a mucosal vaccine for SARS-CoV-2, addressing pressing global health challenges. Currently, he is a part of several interdisciplinary teams working on the Targeted Hybrid Oncotherapeutic Regulation (THOR) project. This innovative project aims to revolutionize immunotherapy outcomes for ovarian cancer patients.
Theenash Sengupta - High School Student
Theenash Sengupta is a student at Mission San Jose High School interested in cancer evolution and immunotherapy. In particular, he is intrigued by how bulk sequencing data can be analyzed to track shifts in T-cell subpopulations within the tumor microenvironment. In his free time, Theenash can be found running or surfing Wikipedia.
George Wythes - PhD Student - Genetics
George graduated from California Institute of Technology with a degree in bioengineering. His undergraduate work was focused on developing new tools for creating synthetic genomes in bacteria. Now, he is interested in applying engineering principles to understanding and modifying the immune interactions underlying antigen tolerance.
Zhewen Xiong - Postdoctoral Scholar
Zhewen completed her Ph.D. and continued her postdoctoral training at the Chinese University of Hong Kong under the mentorship of Dr. Alfred Sze-Lok Cheng. Her research in Dr. Cheng’s lab focused on adaptive resistance to immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). She has established novel ICB-resistant mouse models that recapitulate the immune landscape of human ‘cold’ HCC.  Her study uncovered an adaptive transcriptional program to evade therapeutic pressure by immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment remodeling. She also worked on single-cell dissection of tumor ecosystem dynamics upon ICB therapy in human HCC.
Yipeng Zhang - Life Science Research Professional 1
Yipeng graduated from the University of California, San Diego, with a B.S. in General Biology. At UCSD, Yipeng conducted research with Dr. Jack Bui, investigating the immunological mechanisms underlying cancer stem cell (CSC) formation, with a particular emphasis on how type-II interferon influences CSC-related signaling pathways. In our lab, Yipeng is excited to explore tumor-immune interactions and the dynamics of the immune microenvironment during cancer metastasis, with future aspirations of pursuing a Ph.D. in immunology. Outside the lab, Yipeng enjoys social dancing, performing Chinese folk and traditional dance, watching films, traveling to new places, and spending quality time with friends.

Alumni

Farah Hasanain - Wesleyan University (Undergraduate Student)

Farah Hasanain is a senior at Wesleyan University (Class of 2026), majoring in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, with minors in Chemistry and Molecular Biophysics. Prior to joining the lab, she was a research fellow in the Palucka Lab at The Jackson Laboratory, where she contributed to the development of CAR-T cell therapy for breast cancer. In our lab,  Farah is particularly interested in designing therapeutic strategies to disrupt antigen-specific tolerance in metastatic cancer and plans to pursue a Ph.D. in immunology after graduation.
Nicolas Sanidad - Administrative Associate
Anika Wadhera (Undergraduate) - University of Washington (MSTP MD/PhD Student)
Alice Wang (MS Student) - Princeton (PhD Student)
Alice graduated with honors from Stanford University with a B.S. in Biology on the Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology track. Her undergraduate research in Dr. Robbie Majzner's lab was studying gangliosides and their role in the antibody-induced cell death mechanism in pediatric neuroblastoma. Now, her project in the Reticker-Flynn lab focuses on the role of IFNα and IFNγ receptors in interferon stimulated genes expression in lymph node metastatic cancer models. In her free time, Alice enjoys reading and writing fiction, social dancing, trying out new restaurants, and hanging out with friends.
Lan Zheng (LSRP1) - MD Anderson (PhD Student)
Lan graduated from The University of Texas at Austin with a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering and a minor in Business. At UT Austin, Lan worked with Dr. Amy Brock to re-engineer the ClonMapper barcoding system to study how intra-tumoral heterogeneity and plasticity contribute to drug resistance in triple-negative breast cancer. She also worked with Dr. Wei Wei at the Institute for Systems Biology to investigate targeted therapy resistance through adaptive mutability and DNA repair changes in BRAF-mutant melanoma. As a Life Science Research Professional in the Reticker-Flynn Lab, Lan is interested in studying the co-evolutionary dynamics between tumors and the immune response during metastasis. Outside of the lab, Lan enjoys social dancing, reading, playing piano, and finding the best tacos in town.