Liver tissue-resident natural killer cells

Wayne Yokoyama

Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Washington University School of Medicine

Dr. Yokoyama is the Sam J. Levin and Audrey Loew Levin Professor of Arthritis Research, Professor of Medicine and of Pathology and Immunology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He received his B.A. from the University of Rochester, M.D. from the University of Hawaii, clinical training in internal medicine and rheumatology at the University of Iowa, and postdoctoral research training at the University of Iowa and the National Institutes of Health. In 1995, he joined Washington University to become Chief of the Rheumatology Division, a position he held until 2007 when he became Director of the Medical Scientist Training Program.   Dr. Yokoyama is credited with seminal discoveries on how natural killer cells sense and kill cancer and infected cells. His awards include the Novartis Prize for Basic Immunology, and election to the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Medicine, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In July 2017, he will become President of the American Association of Immunologists, the largest professional immunology society in the world.