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Faculty Detail    
Name LYSE A NORIAN
  
Campus Address WTI 420E Zip 3300
Phone  (205) 996-0152
E-mail  lnorian@uab.edu
Other websites
     

Education
Undergraduate  Iowa State University    1989  B.S. Microbiology 
Graduate  Iowa State University    1992  M.S. Immunobiology 
Graduate  The University of Iowa    2000  Ph.D. Immunology 


Faculty Appointment(s)
Appointment Type Department Division Rank
Center  Comprehensive Diabetes Center  Comprehensive Diabetes Center Associate Professor
Center  Comprehensive Cancer Center  Comprehensive Cancer Center Associate Professor
Center  Nutrition Sciences   Nutrition Obesity Res Ctr (NORC) Associate Professor
Primary  Nutrition Sciences   Nutrition Sciences Chair Office Associate Professor

Graduate Biomedical Sciences Affiliations
Cancer Biology 
Cell, Molecular, & Developmental Biology 
Immunology 

Biographical Sketch 
Dr. Norian is an Associate Professor in the Department of Nutrition Sciences. She performed her doctoral research in the laboratory of Dr. Gary Koretzky at The University of Iowa, where she studied transcriptional regulation of the pro-apoptotic molecule Fas Ligand on CD8+ T cells. She then moved to the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, where she studied tumor-induced T cell and dendritic cell dysfunction as a post-doctoral fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Paul Allen. Upon completion of her training, Dr. Norian was recruited back to Iowa, where she was promoted to Assistant Professor and began to study the effects of obesity on immune responses to renal tumors.



Research/Clinical Interest
Title
Understanding the effects of diet and obesity on anti-tumor immunity
Description
Dr. Norian’s research is focused on three main areas: 1) defining the mechanisms of tumor-induced immune dysfunction; 2) understanding how diet and obesity alter the quality and magnitude of anti-tumor immune responses; and 3) translating this knowledge into the development of novel, more highly efficacious immunotherapies for solid tumors. Her work in the area of obesity and anti-tumor immunity has led to multiple key findings that are the basis for her current research focus: 1) obesity decreases the stimulatory capacity of splenic dendritic cells, even in the absence of tumor growth; 2) obesity is associated with a heightened accumulation of immunosuppressive myeloid-lineage cells in renal tumors; 3) obesity decreases CD8+ effector T cell anti-tumor responses; and 4) obesity decreases the overall efficacy of immunotherapy for renal tumors, leading to progressive and fatal tumor outgrowth

Keywords
cancer immunology, immunotherapy, obesity, diet, kidney cancer, breast cancer