Early-Career Fellowship (Basic Science) | University of South Australia
Researcher
Dr Carly Whyte was awarded a PhD in immunology from the University of Adelaide in 2018. She was then appointed a postdoctoral scientist at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, where she worked to understand how immune cells are regulated through a cytokine—a small protein in cell signalling—called IL-2. After discovering new mechanisms of action for this protein and identifying new regulatory networks, which explained some of the common side-effects of IL-2’s therapeutic use, Dr Whyte returned to Adelaide and joined the Centre for Cancer Biology at University of South Australia.
Dr Whyte’s current research focuses on head and neck cancers, one of the most common cancers in Australia. Current treatment options are often ineffective and heavily impact a person’s ability to eat, speak and breathe. Dr Whyte aims to discover ways to enhance the ability of immune cells to target and destroy cancers of the head and neck. In particular, she wants to better understand the role of immune cells called eosinophils, which are more common in head and neck tumours than in healthy tissue. Through this research into eosinophils, Dr Whyte hopes to boost the body’s natural immune response to cancer and improve health outcomes.