Faizah Alotaibi
Faizah Alotaibi completed her master degree in pathology and molecular medicine specialization in cancer research at Queen’s university. She is now a PhD candidate under the co-supervision of Dr. James Koropatnick and Dr. Wei-ping Min in the department of Microbiology and Immunology. Her research involves inhibiting both CD5 and Fas receptors on CD8+T cell to increase anti-tumour activity of CD8+ T cells. Using siRNA transfection and/or blocking antibodies she will investigate the role of CD5 and Fas on CD8+T cells activation. ID8 ovarian tumours will be grown in syngeneic mouse tumour homografts. At appropriate times during tumour growth, CD5, Fas, or both will be therapeutically reduced on CD8+ T cells from splenocytes, followed by co-culture with the same tumour cell line used to generate the homografts or unrelated mouse B16F10 melanoma cells. T cell activation (assessed by IL-2 and IFNγ secretion determined by ELISA), proliferation (cell counting) and capacity to kill co-cultured tumour cells (assessed by LDH release assays) will be assessed.
