Biography:

Casey Lee received his combined B.S./M.S. degree in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology from Yale University in 2017. He completed his undergraduate thesis work in the laboratory of Dr. Kevin O’Connor in which he developed a cell-based assay for the sensitive detection of autoantibodies in myasthenia gravis. After graduation, Casey continued to work in the laboratory of Dr. O’Connor as a postgraduate research associate and studied B cell tolerance defects in neuromyelitis optica. Casey started the MD/PhD program at the University of Pennsylvania in 2018 and, with a passion for studying autoantibody mediated diseases, joined the laboratories of Dr. Aimee Payne and Dr. Christoph Ellebrecht to pursue his thesis work. His thesis research plan is to test the role of asymmetric cell division in the differentiation of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) and chimeric autoantibody receptor (CAAR) T cells into effector and memory T cells. Casey plans to attend a research residency program and aspires to become an independent investigator and clinician at an academic medical institution, with a research focus on immunologic mechanisms of disease.