Leila Akkari

Biography

She was trained in cellular and molecular biology during her BA at the University of Montpellier in France, and graduated in 2004 before performing my Master in oncology and immunology between Montpellier and Manchester (England). she then came back to Montpellier to perform her PhD in health sciences in the laboratory of Dr Ula Hibner, at the IGMM CNRS, during which she studied the effects of HCV viral proteins on cancer initiation through alteration of hepatocyte polarity and cell shape. This was her first encounter on how tumor-extrinsic factors can favor pre-neoplastic transformation. Once her PhD finished, she wanted to develop her focus in the tumor microenvironment field, in rare tumors, and she joined Prof. Johanna Joyce's laboratory at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NYC. During this time, she began to work with mouse models of brain and pancreatic cancer, primarily focusing on tumor associated macrophages and their pro-tumorigenic roles in multiple tumor microenvironment. In 2017, she became a Junior Group Leader at the NKI.

Research Interest

Mouse models of brain and pancreatic cancer