/content/dam/www/people-profile-photos/r/aaron-ring/aaron-ring-d.jpg
Ring
Aaron Ring, MD, PhD
- Associate Professor, Translational Science and Therapeutics Division, Fred Hutch
- Member, Immunotherapy Integrated Research Center (IIRC), Fred Hutch
- Anderson Family Endowed Chair for Immunotherapy, Fred Hutch
Background
Dr. Aaron Ring works at the intersection of protein engineering and systems immunology to identify new therapeutic targets for cancer and to create drugs against them. His work has resulted in the development of several innovative cancer therapeutics now being tested in clinical trials, including engineered cytokines and immune receptors. Taking inspiration from the immune system, Dr. Ring’s lab has created a novel platform to screen for autoantibodies — immune proteins our bodies make against our own tissues — across a wide range of diseases. The platform, called REAP (rapid extracellular antigen profiling), allows Dr. Ring and his team to detect antigens, the molecular targets of these natural immune proteins. With the aim of developing autoantibodies into therapeutics, they will use REAP to decode the “autoantibody reactome” (the full complement of autoantibody targets) and pinpoint autoantibodies with beneficial impacts in health and disease. Dr. Ring’s lab also develops approaches to discover novel tumor antigens — specific molecular features that distinguish tumor cells from normal cells — to guide a range of anti-cancer therapies from CAR T cells to antibody-drug conjugates.
Education
MD, Stanford University School of Medicine, 2016
PhD, Stanford University School of Medicine, Structural Biology, 2016
BS, Yale University, Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, 2008
MS, Yale University, Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, 2008
Research Interests
Engineering protein drugs to interrogate complex immunoregulatory pathways
Using directed evolution, the lab develops immune cytokines, immunoreceptors, and antibodies. They apply these drugs in preclinical cancer models and advance them into clinical trials, including ST-067 (the first “decoy-resistant” interleukin-18 based therapy) and evorpacept (ultra-high affinity SIRPα antagonist).
Decoding the autoantibody “reactome” to find natural immune drugs that highlight novel therapeutic targets from “clinical trials of nature”
These studies leverage a powerful autoantibody discovery platform called REAP that was developed by the Ring Lab. Using REAP, the lab conducts “autoantibody-wide association studies” across diverse disease indications ranging from cancer to autoimmunity, neurodegeneration, and infectious disease.
Discovery of novel tumor antigens for the next generation of targeted cancer therapeutics
A major unmet need in oncology is that there simply are not enough tumor-selective targets for most types of cancer. The Ring Lab is developing new approaches and platforms for pinpointing targets to direct CAR-T cells, bispecific antibodies, and antibody drug conjugates. This includes new technologies in proteogenomics and high-throughput functional screening of tumor-reactive antibodies.