Semir Beyaz, PhD

The Seckin Endometriosis Research Center is led by Dr. Semir Beyaz, an Assistant Professor and lead investigator at CSHL. Dr. Beyaz’s work is specifically centered on the intricate connection between genetics, metabolism, and the immune system as it relates to female reproductive health. This area of focus is a direct scientific parallel to the complex, multi-system nature of endometriosis, which is often associated with other inflammatory and immunological diseases.

The leadership team at CSHL, including Dr. Leemor Joshua-Tor, who oversees all basic science research, and Dr. David Tuveson, who leads the cancer center, provides robust cross-disciplinary support for the new initiative. This internal support network reflects CSHL’s unique ability to not only make groundbreaking discoveries in basic biology but also to translate those findings into tangible clinical impacts.

Research

Cells respond and adapt to the signals that they receive from their environment. Environmental factors such as nutrients affect cellular states by altering cell state-specific gene expression or metabolic programs. My research group investigates the causal cellular and molecular mechanisms that link nutrition to organismal health and disease. For example, diets that lead to obesity, such as high fat diets are significant environmental risk factors that influence cancer incidence and progression in several tissues. Although the interactions between tumor cells and the immune system play a significant role in tumorigenesis, little is known about how dietary perturbations impact immunity against cancer. Our studies interrogate the functional consequences of diets on immune recognition and response pathways that play critical role in cancer immunity. By identifying the altered gene expression and metabolic programs in the immune system in response to dietary perturbations, our goal is to uncover mechanistic links that can be therapeutically exploited for the treatment of diseases associated with immune dysfunction such as cancer.

Awards

CSHL Fellow Semir Beyaz wins three awards
The Janeway Award, New England Immunology Conference
Trainee Award, American Association of Immunologists
Outstanding Poster Award, International Society for Stem Cell Research
Zhongmei Chen Yong Travel Award for Scientific Excellence, International Society for Stem Cell Research
Merit Award, International Society for Stem Cell Research
Thermo-Fisher Trainee Achievement Award, American Association of Immunologists

Publications

https://facultyprofiles.cshl.edu/semir.beyaz/publications/