Peter P. Lee is the Chair of the Department of Immuno-Oncology and co-leader of the Cancer Immunotherapeutics Program at the Beckman Research Institute, City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Lee’s research focuses on understanding how the tumor microenvironment (TME) impacts host immune responses in cancer patients, with the goal of developing novel treatments to modulate the TME and restore/enhance immune function in cancer patients. Dr. Lee seeks to rationally integrate immunotherapies into combinations to achieve proper treatment sequencing and maximum clinical efficacy. Towards these ends, he utilizes state-of- the-art technologies – including high-dimensional flow cytometry, quantitative spatial image analysis, and next-generation genomics – to dissect the complex interplay between immune/stromal cells and cancer cells within tumors, tumor-draining lymph nodes (TDLNs), and blood. Dr. Lee’s group also utilizes computational modeling and network analysis to understand the population dynamics of cancer, stroma, and immune responses. Dr. Lee’s team is highly interdisciplinary, combining immunology, pathology, genomics, bioinformatics, and computational modeling.
Dr. Lee trained in clinical immunology at UCSF and hematology at Stanford University. He was a tenured faculty at Stanford before joining City of Hope in 2011, where he is now Billy and Audrey L. Wilder Endowed Professor in Cancer Immunotherapeutics and Chair of Immuno- Oncology. Dr. Lee has over 100 peer-reviewed publications and trained over 20 pre- and postdoctoral fellows. He is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI), and recipient of Damon Runyon Scholar Award (Connie and Bob Lurie Scholar), American Cancer Society Research Scholar Award, Dept. of Defense Era of Hope Scholar Award for Breast Cancer Research, Dept. of Defense Multi-Team Award for Breast Cancer Research, and Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C)/Breast Cancer Research Foundation (BCRF) Convergence Team leader.