People
Principal Investigator
Dr. Saman Maleki
Email: Saman.malekivareki@lhsc.on.ca
Email: Smaleki2@uwo.ca
Twitter: @SMImmunology
Phone: 519-685-8500 ext. 55769
Dr. Maleki is an Associate Professor in the Departments of Oncology, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, and Medical Biophysics. He is also a Scientist at Lawson Health Research Institute.
Saman obtained his Bachelor of Science (BSc) degree in Microbiology from Arak Azad University in Iran in 2004. He then completed his Master’s degree in Microbiology in 2008 at the University of Isfahan located in the beautiful city of Isfahan in Iran. For his Master’s degree, Saman studied the effect of Helicobacter pylori (H.pylori) on suppressing human innate and adaptive immunity. As part of his MSc degree, he spent several months as an exchange student studying the effect of various H.pylori strains on human neutrophils at the University of Freiburg in Germany.
In 2014, Saman obtained his Ph.D. degree from The Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Western University. He worked on two independent projects: 1) The differential effect of blocking mTOR on tumor-reactive and alloreactive T-cells and 2) The immune-independent role of indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) in conferring resistance to chemotherapy and radiation therapy to cancer cells.
During his post-doctoral training, Saman worked on several novel oncology and Immuno-Oncology drugs at the pre-clinical stage before those drugs entered the phase I clinical trial in patients. His studies also helped inform the design of some of the arms in those clinical trials.
Current Members
Rene Figueredo
MSc, Lab Manager and Chief Technician
Email: rfiguere@uwo.ca
Rene received his MSc in Molecular Biology from The University of Havana (Cuba). Rene has expertise is various molecular biology techniques and animal studies including syngeneic and xenograft tumor models.
Megan Hong
PhD Candidate
Megan is a PhD candidate in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. Her research focuses on defining the mechanisms underlying response and resistance to immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy in DNA mismatch repair-deficient tumours. In particular, she investigates how the tumour microenvironment influences macrophage-T-cell interactions and how these interactions govern responses to immune checkpoint inhibitors. Her work combines preclinical tumour models, in vitro assays, flow cytometry, and transcriptomic approaches to identify mechanisms of treatment resistance and potential strategies to improve therapeutic response.
Behnam Jabbari Zadeh
MSc, Research Analyst
Email: bjabbar@uwo.ca
Behnam is the lab’s bioinformatician and data scientist, working across microbiome research, computational biology and cancer immunotherapy. He holds a Master’s in Computer Science from Western University. His work centres on analysing complex biological datasets, in particular shotgun metagenomic sequencing data from the lab’s fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) trials, to understand how the gut microbiome influences treatment response, toxicity and clinical outcomes. He is interested in computational approaches that turn large-scale biological data into meaningful insights, bridging bioinformatics, clinical research and personalised medicine.
Outside the lab, Behnam plays chess and tinkers with hands-on projects, from 3D printing and electronics to trying out new AI tools.
Sophie Harris
Clinical Research Assistant
Email: sophie.harris@lhsc.on.ca
Sophie received her degree at Western University in 2023 and a post graduate certificate in Research and Evaluation, at Fanshawe College in 2024. She completed a Co-op requirement for Fanshawe at the Maleki Lab, where she now works as a Clinical Research Assistant. She is involved in numerous studies including CHiMeRA, CHASe-PDAC, and the Microbiome study for various cancer types as well as healthy donors. If you are interested in participating as a healthy donor, you may email sophie.harris@lhsc.on.ca.
Marina Ninkov
Research Associate and Staff Scientist
Marina is a Research Associate and Staff Scientist in the Maleki Lab with expertise in immunotoxicology, host–microbe interactions and regional immune reactivity, with a particular focus on cancer immunology. Her research interests centre on translating scientific discoveries into accessible, reliable diagnostic tools and effective treatments for cancer, driven by the belief that science should make a meaningful difference in people’s lives and contribute to a cancer-free world.
Outside the lab, Marina enjoys epic fantasy novels (Ursula K. Le Guin, Terry Pratchett, Joe Abercrombie and Isaac Asimov) and spending time at the gym. She is a passionate advocate for animal rights and a devoted dog enthusiast.
Niloofar
Title
Email: email@uwo.ca
Bio to come.
Yasamin Minazadeh, MSc
PhD Candidate
Email: yminazad@uwo.ca
Yasamin (Yasi) is a PhD candidate in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. She previously earned a master’s degree in Microbiology and Immunology at Western University. Her research focuses on the immunology of breast cancer, in particular how bacterial-derived metabolites affect immune cell activation in cancer treatments. She also studies how prebiotics and diet affect immune cell activation and how this impacts cancer immunotherapy by reducing immune-related side effects.
Harry
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Email: email@uwo.ca
Bio to come.
Sofia
Title
Email: email@uwo.ca
Bio to come.
Eric
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Email: email@uwo.ca
Bio to come.
Garrett
Title
Email: email@uwo.ca
Bio to come.
Danial Hadi
MD, Medical Oncology GI Fellow
Email: danial.hadi@lhsc.on.ca
Danial is a Medical Oncology Fellow in Pancreatic cancer and Melanoma under the co-supervision of Dr John Lenehan (Medical Oncology) and Dr Saman Maleki (Experimental Oncology) with a focus on microbiome manipulation with Fecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT) combined with Immunotherapy. He graduated from medical school at Khyber Medical University, Pakistan, and completed his Internal Medicine Residency and Medical Oncology Training Program under the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (RCPI).
Jason King Talao
MD, Medical Oncology GU Fellow
Email: jason.talao@lhsc.on.ca
King is a Medical Oncology Fellow in Genitourinary Malignancies under the co-supervision of Dr. Ricardo Fernandes (Medical Oncology) and Dr. Saman Maleki (Experimental Oncology) with a focus on relationship dynamics of genitourinary and gut microbiome with immunotherapy and antibody-drug conjugates. He graduated from Angeles University Foundation - School of Medicine, Philippines, and completed his Internal Medicine Residency in Jose B. Lingad Memorial General Hospital and Medical Oncology Training Program under the National Kidney and Transplant Insitute.
Academic Collaborators
Dr. Ricardo Fernandes
Medical Oncologist, London Regional Cancer Program
Dr. John Lenehan
Medical Oncologist, London Regional Cancer Program
Lawson Health Research Institute profile
Previous Members
Tiffany Cheung
MSc Candidate
Email: tcheun89@uwo.ca
MSc candidate in the Department of Pathology in Laboratory Medicine. Tiffany is investigating antibiotic-induced changes in the gut microbiome and its downstream effects on mismatch repair-deficient tumour growth and immunotherapy response.
Chloe Davidson
MSc Candidate
Email: cdavid83@uwo.ca
MSc Candidate in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. Chloe is studying the role of dendritic cells in anti-tumour immunity against tumours with mismatch repair deficiency.
Kelly Baines
PhD, Postdoctoral Associate
Email: kbaines5@uwo.ca
Kelly received her PhD from Western University in 2022 with her research focusing on innate immune function during pregnancy and placental adaptations. She currently working as a postdoctoral associate where she helps contribute to several projects focusing on increasing immunotherapy efficacy in various cancer models.
Anorin Ali
4th Year Student
Email: aali482@uwo.ca
Anorin is a fourth-year thesis student pursuing an Honours Specialization in Bioinformatics. Her project focuses on the development of an R shiny application for clinical and metagenomic data exploration.
Cassidy Da Costa
Clinical Research Assistant
Email: cassidy.dacosta@lhsc.on.ca
Cassidy received her Medical Laboratory Technician Diploma in 2018 at Westervelt College and has worked in a laboratory atmosphere for several years now. She is currently working as a Clinical Research Assistant (CRA) and works on multiple clinical studies including INTEGUT, prostate cancer project, and a pancreatic cancer and melanoma study on our microbiome Biobank.
Hasti Gholami
MSc Candidate
Email: hgholam@uwo.ca
MSc Candidate in the Department of Pathology in Laboratory Medicine. Hasti is studying the role of gut microbes of immunotherapy responders in transforming the immune phenotype of a host's tumor.
Amanda Liddy
MSc Candidate
Email: aliddy2@uwo.ca
MSc Candidate in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. Amanda is investigating bacterial-based therapy to modulate tumour and gut microbiome and activate T-cells in pancreatic cancer.
Adnan Rajeh
MD, Medical Oncology GU Fellow (2023-2024)
I graduated from medical school at the University of Damascus, Syria. I completed my internal medicine residency at Western university and am currently a PGY5 and chief resident of the medical oncology program at western. Adnan is doing an extra year of fellowship this in genitourinary cancers under the co-supervision of Dr. Maleki (division of Experimental Oncology) and Dr. Ricardo Fernandes (division of Medical Oncology) with a focus on different translational and clinical research fields in GU cancers.
Yeganeh Yousefi
MSc, Research Assistant
Yeganeh completed her M.Sc. degree in January 2022 on gut microbiota-parasite interactions in regulating goblet cell responses at McMaster University. She currently works as a Research Assistant, investigating the function of microbiota on the efficacy of cancer immunotherapy.
Jasna Deluce
MD, Medical Oncology GU Fellow
Email: jasna.deluce@lhsc.on.ca
Research interest: I am studying the effect of inducing mismatch repair deficiency in the immunogenicity of prostate cancer. I have been also working on a couple of review articles including gut microbiome and response to immunotherapy treatment in advanced renal cell cancer, and biomarker-driven target therapies in prostate cancer. I will also be working on a retrospective study looking at the correlation between immunotherapy-related drug toxicity and immunotherapy efficacy, as well as plans to work on a prospective research study profiling the microbiome in various states of prostate cancer for patients on androgen receptor axis targeted agents.
Lara Gerhardt
MSc Candidate
Email: lgerhard@uwo.ca
Current Program: MSc Candidate in the Department of Pathology in Laboratory Medicine.
Current Project: Lara is studying mechanisms related to CD39 induction on tumor-specific effector T-cells in solid cancers.
Jessica Jeong
4th Year Medical Science Student (2022-2023)
Jessica is a 4th year Pathology undergraduate who completed her Honours Thesis project in Dr. Maleki's lab from 2022 to 2023. Her project assessed the presence of remnant Cas9 protein in CRISPR-Cas9 edited cells to exclude the protein as a source of immunogenicity.
Mithunah Krishnamoorthy
PhD, Post-Doctoral Fellow
Email: mithunah.krishnamoorthy@lhsc.on.ca
Current Program: Post-doctoral fellow Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, PhD in immunology from University of Toronto (2018)
Current Project: Determining immune responses and gut microbiota changes in metastatic melanoma / metastatic renal carcinoma patients receiving fecal microbiota transplants in addition to standard care immunotherapy.
Marwa Said
MBBS, Graduate Diploma Student
Graduate Diploma Student in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Western University. Marwa is studying the effect of Akkermansia muciniphila on pancreatic cancer cell response to immunotherapy.
Yili Xu
4th Year Medical Science Student
Email: yxu655@uwo.ca
Yili is a 4-year Medical Science student at Western in the Microbiology and Immunology with Pathology module working on her honors thesis in the laboratory of Dr. Maleki.
Current Project: Examining MHC-I molecules in tumor cells (neuroblastoma and melanoma) with or without mismatch repair deficiency.
