Soniya Pinto is currently working at the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Diagnostic Imaging Department, Comprehensive Cancer Center. Her research is interested in the imaging of neurologic complications of CAR-T cells; investigating the use of the Apparent Diffusion Coefficient as a predictive marker for neurotoxicity in CAR-T cell patients; and applications of proton MR spectroscopy in non-oncologic CNS diseases. She was awarded the 2022 CHLA core pilot research award.

Giedre Krenciute is a faculty member in the Department of Bone Marrow Transplantation and Cellular Therapy at St Jude Children’s Research Hospital. She received her Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Baylor College of Medicine (BCM), followed by post-doctoral training in the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy at BCM. The major focus of her laboratory is to develop an effective immunotherapy for pediatric brain tumors using genetically modified T cells. Research areas include generating and optimizing CAR T-cells to target brain tumor-associated antigens, enhancing CAR T-cell effector functions by different next-generation genetic manipulations, and understanding tumor escape mechanisms to design superior immunotherapy-based treatments.