The role of antigen-specific T cell responses in SARS-CoV-2 infection

Yanchun Peng is a senior Postdoctoral researcher working at the Human Immunology Unit, Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine, University of Oxford. After completing her undergraduate studies and then teaching in China, she moved the UK, first working as a research assistant, then completing her DPhil and remaining as a Postdoc in the research group led by Prof. Tao Dong since 2005. She has acquired extensive experience and skills in human T cell immunology with the major focus of her research being on evaluating anti-viral efficacy of virus-specific T cells and the interaction of host and virus in HIV infection, HIV/HCV co-infection and influenza infection. Her recent interest is to study the Viral OncoProtein(VOP) and tumor Specific Protein(TSP) specific T cell responses in virus associated cancer (ie HBV/HCC; EBV/NPC and HPV/CC) by combining cutting edge technologies (such as multi-colour Flow cytometry, Mass Cytometry (CyTOF), single cell RNASeq with SmartSeq 2 and 10X Chromium) with my expertise in isolating, expanding and characterising virus/tumor-specific T cells in vitro. Being equipped with these well-established platforms, skills and knowledge in human T cell immunology, she swiftly switched my work from cancer to COVID-19, as the pandemic started in 2020: exploring the role of SARS-CoV-2 -specific T cells in COVID-19 infection.