It is with great excitement that I am able to announce that Matthew H. Spitzer, PhD has joined the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery with an appointment in Microbiology and Immunology. Matt is currently a Sandler and Parker Fellow at UCSF.
Matt earned his BS in Biology at Georgetown University Summa Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa where he was awarded a Howard Hughes Undergraduate Research Scholarship. He then obtained his PhD in Immunology at Stanford. He was a postdoctoral fellow under Gary Nolan and Edgar Engleman at Stanford. He then joined UCSF in 2016 as a Sandler and Parker Fellow where he has pursued work in tumor immunology and systems biology working in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology directed by Lewis Lanier. Matt works on HPV as it relates to squamous cell carcinoma and has partnered with Jennifer Grandis, Dan Johnson, and Patrick Ha on neoadjuvant clinical trials of immunotherapy in head and neck squamous carcinoma. He also is investigating the impact of obesity and high fat diet on the immune response to cancer and on the impact of metastasis on the immune system and its effect on immunotherapy. Matt is an expert in CyTOF technology and will be helping to further establish and improve a core facility with CyTOF capability at UCSF.
Matt was fortunate to be selected as the recipient of Chan Zuckerberg resource support during his recruitment. For this resource we owe thanks to Lewis Lanier’s support, and directly to Talmadge King, and Sam Hawgood. Also we owe a debt of gratitude to Alan Ashworth, PhD who helped significantly in developing a recruitment package for Matt.
Matt’s laboratory will be in HSW 15 which is Michael Bishop’s former lab space.
I know that Matt will be a major contributor to advancing translational care for head and neck cancer patients and will be a valued partner within the HDFCCC.
Please join me in welcoming Matt to the UCSF OHNS team!
Andrew H. Murr, MD, FACS
Professor and Chairman
Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery
University of California, San Francisco
School of Medicine
