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Dr

Fern Koay

Research Fellow
Microbiology And Immunology
science & technology
life sciences & biomedicine
immunology
animals
humans
mice
activation
mice, inbred c57bl
mucosal-associated invariant t cells
Fern Koay's Profile Picture
Dr

Fern Koay

 
Division
Medicine, Dentistry And Health Sciences
 
Primary Interest
Innate T cell Biology
Fern Koay's Profile Picture
Dr

Fern Koay

 
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Fern's  Short Profile
 

Fern is a postdoctoral research fellow in the Godfrey laboratory at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, at The University of Melbourne. She completed a highly successful PhD in 2017 for which she received the departmental QIAGEN PhD Award, the Zoetis PhD Oration award, and the Victorian Government Premier’s Award for Health and Medical Research (Basic Science) on identifying, characterising and mapping thymic development of an immune cell type called MAIT cells.

Since 2015, Fern has published numerous research papers as lead author (including Nature Immunology, Science Immunology, Nature Communications and Journal of Experimental Medicine), co-authored articles (including Nature Immunology, Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology and Nature Communications) and have co-written invited reviews and commentaries. She regularly presents at international and national conferences accompanied by travel awards, and contributes to the external peer review process. In addition, Fern is passionate about communicating science through Day of Immunology and National Science Week roles. She exhibits ongoing early career leadership and profile that extends to the university faculty level, by co-chairing the MDHS ECR network and bringing the network’s voice to the faculty council table. Most recently Fern secured a competitive NHMRC Early Career Research Fellowship in 2019 to continue her research, extending upon innate-like T cell development, homeostasis, subsets and their functional diversity, with a view to harness these unconventional immune cells in a variety of disease settings and immunotherapies.

Projects

Displaying the 1 most recent project by Fern Koay.

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CHARACTERISATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF MAIT CELLS

2019 - 2022
Active

1

Projects

Project Types

1

Research Grant

Scholarly Works

Displaying the 10 most recent scholarly works by Fern Koay.

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An unconventional view of COVID-19 T cell immunity

Hui-Fern Koay, Thomas S Fulford, Dale I Godfrey

Journal article  |  2020  |  Journal of Experimental Medicine

In this issue of JEM, Jouan et al. (https://doi.org/10.1084/jem.20200872) report the activation and skewed function of unconventio..

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Thymic development of unconventional T cells: how NKT cells, MAIT cells and gamma delta T cells emerge

Daniel G Pellicci, Hui-Fern Koay, Stuart P Berzins

Journal article  |  2020  |  Nature Reviews Immunology

T cell lineages are defined by specialized functions and differential expression of surface antigens, cytokines and transcription ..

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Human Mucosal-Associated Invariant T Cells in Older Individuals Display Expanded TCR alpha beta Clonotypes with Potent Antimicrobial Responses

Liyen Loh, Nicholas A Gherardin, Sneha Sant, Ludivine Grzelak, Jeremy Chase Crawford, Nicola L Bird, Hui-Fern Koay, Carolien E van de Sandt, Marcela L Moreira, Martha Lappas, E Kaitlynn Allen, Jane Crowe, Thomas Loudovaris, Katie L Flanagan, Kylie M Quinn, Jamie Rossjohn, Paul G Thomas, Sidonia BG Eckle, James McCluskey, Dale I Godfrey, et al.

Journal article  |  2020  |  The Journal of Immunology

Mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cells are important for immune responses against microbial infections. Although known to und..

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Characterization and Purification of Mouse Mucosal-Associated Invariant T (MAIT) Cells.

Zhenjun Chen, Huimeng Wang, Criselle D'Souza, Hui-Fern Koay, Bronwyn Meehan, Zhe Zhao, Troi Pediongco, Mai Shi, Tianyuan Zhu, Bingjie Wang, Lars Kjer-Nielsen, Sidonia BG Eckle, Jamie Rossjohn, David P Fairlie, Dale I Godfrey, Richard A Strugnell, James McCluskey, Alexandra J Corbett

Journal article  |  2019  |  Current Protocols in Immunology

This unit describes the utility of various mouse models of infection and immunization for studying mucosal-associated invariant T ..

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A divergent transcriptional landscape underpins the development and functional branching of MAIT cells

H-F Koay, S Su, D Amann-Zalcenstein, SR Daley, I Comerford, L Miosge, CE Whyte, IE Konstantinov, Y d'Udekem, T Baldwin, PF Hickey, SP Berzins, JYW Mak, Y Sontani, CM Roots, T Sidwell, A Kallies, Z Chen, S Nussing, K Kedzierska, et al.

Journal article  |  2019  |  Science Immunology

MR1-restricted mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cells play a unique role in the immune system. These cells develop intrathymi..

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Guidelines for the use of flow cytometry and cell sorting in immunological studies (second edition)

Andrea Cossarizza, Hyun-Dong Chang, Andreas Radbruch, Andreas Acs, Dieter Adam, Sabine Adam-Klages, William W Agace, Nima Aghaeepour, Muebeccel Akdis, Matthieu Allez, Larissa Nogueira Almeida, Giorgia Alvisi, Graham Anderson, Immanuel Andrae, Francesco Annunziato, Achille Anselmo, Petra Bacher, Cosima T Baldari, Sudipto Bari, Vincenzo Barnaba, et al.

Journal article  |  2019  |  European Journal of Immunology

These guidelines are a consensus work of a considerable number of members of the immunology and flow cytometry community. They pro..

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The biology and functional importance of MAIT cells

Dale Godfrey, Hui-Fern Koay, James McCluskey, Nicholas A Gherardin

Journal article  |  2019  |  Nature Immunology

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TCF-1 limits the formation of Tc17 cells via repression of the MAF-ROR gamma t axis

Lisa A Mielke, Yang Liao, Ella Bridie Clemens, Matthew A Firth, Brigette Duckworth, Qiutong Huang, Francisca F Almeida, Michael Chopin, Hui-Fern Koay, Carolyn A Bell, Soroor Hediyeh-Zadeh, Simone L Park, Dinesh Raghu, Jarny Choi, Tracy L Putoczki, Philip D Hodgkin, Ashley E Franks, Laura K Mackay, Dale Godfrey, Melissa J Davis, et al.

Journal article  |  2019  |  Journal of Experimental Medicine

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Cysteine and hydrophobic residues in CDR3 serve as distinct T-cell self-reactivity indices

Stephen R Daley, Hui-Fern Koay, Kerry Dobbs, Marita Bosticardo, Rushika C Wirasinha, Francesca Pala, Riccardo Castagnoli, Jared H Rowe, Lisa M Ott de Bruin, Sevgi Keles, Yu Nee Lee, Raz Somech, Steven M Holland, Ottavia M Delmonte, Debbie Draper, Sandra Maxwell, Julie Niemela, Jennifer Stoddard, Sergio D Rosenzweig, Pietro Luigi Poliani, et al.

Journal article  |  2019  |  Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology

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Diverse MR1-restricted T cells in mice and humans.

Hui-Fern Koay, Nicholas A Gherardin, Calvin Xu, Rebecca Seneviratna, Zhe Zhao, Zhenjun Chen, David P Fairlie, James McCluskey, Daniel G Pellicci, Adam P Uldrich, Dale I Godfrey

Journal article  |  2019  |  Nature Communications

Mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cells express an invariant TRAV1/TRAJ33 TCR-α chain and are restricted to the MHC-I-like mol..

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Scholarly Works

Keyword Analysis

Immunology
Clinical Health (organs, Diseases and Abnormal Conditions)
Biochemistry and Cell Biology
Indigenous Health
Medical Microbiology
Other Health

Honours, Awards and Fellowships

2018

Premier's Awards for Health and Medical Research - Basic Science

Victoria State Government
2019

NHMRCF - NHMRC Fellowship

2

Awards

Credentials

Positions

Positions

Research Fellow

Microbiology And Immunology

Ongoing Member

Australasian Society for Immunology (ASI)

Education

Education

Doctor of Philosophy

University of Melbourne

Bachelor of Biomedicine (Honours)

University of Melbourne

Links

Links