Amanda Heard

Professional Background

I was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. I spent my entire life in the city until I moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma to attend college. I graduated from the University of Tulsa with a Bachelor of Science in Biology, with a minor in Spanish, and spent most of my time during undergrad either studying or running as a Cross Country and Track athlete. During the summers, I would return to St. Louis to work in Dr. Matt Walter’s hematology lab at Washington University. I was involved in a project investigating the role of the mutant U2AF1 spliceosome gene in hematopoiesis and myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) pathogenesis.

Upon graduation, I was offered a full-time lab position at Washington University, working in Dr. Nathan Singh’s lab. I spent the next two years working to better understand chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell biology, specifically focusing on molecular mechanisms responsible for driving differential activity between CAR products with differing co-stimulatory regions.

I’m very excited to start my G1 year in the lab of Christy Hagan, where I will be investigating the mechanism of progesterone and progesterone receptor signaling on modulating the immune phenotype in the hormone receptor positive (HR+) breast cancer tumor microenvironment.

Mentor: Christy Hagan, Cancer Biology.