Dr. Chen Yao is an assistant professor in the Department of Immunology and the Kidney Cancer Program at UT Southwestern Medical Center. Having earned her Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota under the guidance of Dr. Daniel Kaplan, Dr. Yao furthered her expertise through postdoctoral training in the systems immunology laboratory led by Dr. John O'Shea at the National Institutes of Health. Leveraging advanced computational and experimental techniques, the Yao lab focuses on uncovering transcriptional, epigenetic, and metabolic pathways that govern T cell differentiation and function during cancer and chronic viral infection. Dr. Yao's research in the AKCI focuses on investigating the role of stem-like CD8 T cells in immunotherapy against renal cell cancer.