Dr. Naoto Hirano
Clinician Scientist I

Dr. Naoto Hirano’s research program aims to devise novel anti-tumor immunotherapeutic modalities that can cure cancer. Dr. Hirano’s research team is particularly interested in understanding how the interactions between T cells and antigen-presenting cells affect priming, expansion, persistence and differentiation of T cells, as well as how this leads to the subsequent generation and maintenance of anti-tumor T cell memory.
Current affiliations
- Clinician Scientist I, OICR
- Associate Director for Research, Tumour Immunotherapy Program, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre
- Senior Scientist, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre
- Professor of Medicine, Department of Immunology, University of Toronto
Research interests
- Cancer immunotherapy
- Adoptive T-cell therapy
Select publications
- Sugata K, Matsunaga Y, Yamashita Y, Nakatsugawa M, …, Hirano N. Affinity-matured HLA class II dimers for robust staining of antigen-specific CD4+T cells. Nat Biotechnol. 2021.
- Murata K, Nakatsugawa M, Rahman MA, Nguyen LT, …, Hirano N. Landscape mapping of shared antigenic epitopes and their cognate TCRs of tumor-infiltrating T lymphocytes in melanoma. eLife. 2020.
- Benveniste PM, Roy S, Nakatsugawa M, …, Hirano N, …, Zúñiga-Pflücker JC. Generation and molecular recognition of melanoma-associated antigen-specific human γδ T cells. Sci Immunol. 2018
- Kagoya Y, Tanaka S, Guo T, …, Hirano N. A novel chimeric antigen receptor containing a JAK-STAT signaling domain mediates superior antitumor effects. Nat Med. 2018; 24(3):352-359.
- Yamashita Y, Anczurowski M, Nakatsugawa M, …, Hirano N. HLA-DP84Gly constitutively presents endogenous peptides generated by the class I antigen processing pathway. Nat Commun. 2017; 8:15244.
See Dr. Hirano’s recent publications on PubMed.
Previous experience and education
- Assistant Professor of Medicine, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School
Related links
University Health Network Researcher Page – Dr. Naoto Hirano
Opportunities to collaborate
To collaborate with Dr. Hirano, please contact him directly.
Visit OICR’s Collaborative Research Resources directory for more opportunities to collaborate with OICR researchers.
Contact
Dr. Naoto Hirano
Naoto.Hirano@uhnresearch.ca