Crystal Mackall

Crystal L Mackall MD is the Ernest and Amelia Gallo Family Professor and Professor of Pediatrics and Internal Medicine at Stanford University. She is the Founding Director of the Stanford Center for Cancer Cell Therapy, Associate Director of Stanford Cancer Institute, Leader of the Cancer Immunology Program and Director of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at Stanford. During a 27 year tenure culminating as Chief of the Pediatric Oncology Branch, NCI, and now at Stanford (https://med.stanford.edu/mackalllab.html), she leads an internationally recognized an oncology research program focusing on immunology that spans basic, translational and clinical research. Her work creates new knowledge and simultaneously develops therapeutics. Her work is credited with identifying an essential role for the thymus in T cell regeneration and discovering IL-7 as the master regulator of T cell homeostasis. She has conducted numerous early phase and first-in-human and first-in-child clinical trials using numerous immune therapies including one that has been granted Breakthrough Therapy Designation by the FDA. Her group has identified a major feature limiting the activity of an immune therapy called CAR T cells and has developed novel approaches to prevent and reverse this feature. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Richard V. Smalley Award highlighting her achievements in immuno-oncology, the AACR-St. Baldrick’s Award for Outstanding Achievement in Pediatric Cancer Research, and the ASCO Pediatric Oncology Award. She is a member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Physicians and the AACR Academy. She serves in numerous national leadership positions, including co-PI on the NCI Pediatric Cancer Immunotherapy Network (U54), and co-Leader of the St. Baldrick’s-StandUp2Cancer Pediatric Dream Team. She is Board Certified in Pediatrics, Pediatric Hematology-Oncology, and Internal Medicine.