University of Illinois Cancer Center and Department of Physiology and Biophysics Seminar
Monday, May 11, 2026
Speaker: Jackie Bader, PhD
Research Assistant Professor
University of Chicago
Topic: Decoding the Obesity Paradox: Reprogramming Tumor-Associated Macrophages to Drive Checkpoint Sensitivity
Description: Jackie Bader, PhD, is a Research Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago whose research centers on immunometabolism and how macrophage metabolism shapes obesity‑associated cancer progression and immunotherapy response. Her work revealed that obesity induces PD‑1 expression on macrophages to suppress antitumor immunity, leading to a first‑author Nature publication.
Her seminar will explore how obesity rewires macrophages and bone marrow immune progenitors to create durable metabolic states that influence PD‑1 signaling, tumor immunity and response to checkpoint blockade.
She completed postdoctoral training at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and earned her PhD from the University of South Carolina. As a recipient of NCI K22 and Department of Defense awards, her future program aims to define how obesity reprograms bone marrow immune progenitors, creating long‑term metabolic memory that influences cancer immunity.
Time: Noon – 1 p.m.
Location: In Person – COMRB 5175
