MD
Professor
Co-Leader, UNC Lineberger Immunology Research Program
UNC-Chapel Hill
Immunology
Area of Interest
Gianpietro Dotti, MD, is a research professor of microbiology and immunology at UNC and director of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center Immunotherapy Program. Dotti received his medical degree at the University of Milan in Milan, Italy, in 1989 with subsequent clinical training and board certification in hematology at the University of Parma in Parma, Italy, in 1995. From 1996 to 1999, he completed a research fellowship in molecular biology at Ospedali Riuniti di Bergamo in Bergamo, Italy, where he developed technologies to detect minimal residual disease in hematological malignancies and studied molecular mechanisms of post-transplant lymphomas. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in translation research at the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas.
In 2002, he joined the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy at Baylor initially as an instructor and then ranking all the academic positions up to professor with tenure in 2014. It was there that Dotti studied immunotherapy strategies to treat patients with hematologic malignancies including lymphomas and leukemia. In particular, he developed the program of the CD19-specific chimeric antigen receptor in that institution and cloned a novel chimeric antigen receptor targeting the light chain of human immunoglobulins. Dotti was also involved in developing CAR-based strategies to target neuroblastoma in pediatric patients. In collaboration with Brenner he also developed the clinical phase of a novel safety switch for T-cells based on the human caspase-9. Dotti is continuing his research at UNC with particular interest in developing CAR-T cells for the treatment of solid tumors.
Awards and Honors
- Highly Cited Researchers (Top 1%), Web of Science, Clarivate Analytics, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023
News and Stories
Curated cancer care
UNC Lineberger researchers are using CAR-T to create better and personalized cancer treatments in one of the largest cell therapy facilities on the East Coast.
UNC Lineberger faculty named world’s most highly cited researchers
Twelve UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center members were named to Clarivate’s 2023 Highly Cited Researchers™ list, which recognized scientists who published papers that ranked in the top 1% of cited publications in their field between 2012-2022.
American Association for Cancer Research’s annual meeting to feature UNC Lineberger experts, research
UNC Lineberger faculty and trainees will be presenting their research findings and sharing their insights at education sessions during the American Association for Cancer Research’s annual meeting April 14-19.
UNC Lineberger pancreatic cancer therapy studies backed by 5-year, $10.9 million NIH SPORE grant
The National Cancer Institute has awarded the UNC Lineberger Pancreatic Cancer Center of Excellence a five-year, $10.9 million Pancreatic Cancer Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) grant.
