Shabi Soheili is a molecular biologist with over 10 years' experience in cell and gene therapy for hematological diseases and is currently R&D Director of Smart Immune.
Her research focuses on the development of new therapeutic approaches, in particular T-cell-based cell and gene therapy for inherited and acquired immuno-hematological disorders. She has studied T-cells, from progenitors to mature and functional cytotoxic cells, by genetically engineering them at different stages of development. On these subjects, she is the author and co-author of numerous publications in peer-reviewed journals.
At the Necker Hospital in Paris, she took part in several clinical trials by conducting preclinical studies based on the use of ex vivo genetically modified hematopoietic stem cells to treat patients with hereditary diseases. She was also involved in the development of an artificial thymus, which has been patented and is currently under investigation in a clinical trial aiming at evaluating its ability to reduce the period of immune deficiency after bone marrow transplantation in severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) and acute lymphoblastic and acute myeloid leukemia (ALL/AML).
Today, at Smart Immune, her efforts are concentrating on increasing the potency of allogeneic CAR-T cells to overcome the lack of persistence and the risk of graft versus host disease inherent in the allogeneic context.
