Speaker Profile
Ph.D., Postdoctoral Researcher, Penn Medicine
Biography
Laura Volta, Ph.D., is a postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of Saar Gill at the University of Pennsylvania, where she develops next-generation cellular immunotherapies for cancer. Her work focuses on strategies that make engineered T-cell therapies more flexible, controllable, and effective, particularly for acute myeloid leukemia and other diseases in which safe, durable target selection remains difficult. Before joining Penn in 2025, Dr. Volta trained in Zurich, where she studied adaptor CAR T-cell platforms and bispecific immune engagers for AML in the laboratory of Markus Manz. She earned her Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences at ETH Zurich under Dario Neri, investigating antibody-based approaches for leukemia, after earlier training in biomedical engineering and antibody-drug conjugates in Italy. Her research combines antibody engineering, T-cell biology, translational disease models, and therapeutic design. A central goal is to build modular immune-cell platforms that can recognize clinically important targets while improving safety and adaptability as tumors evolve.
Session Abstract – PMWC 2027 Silicon Valley
Track Chair:
Razelle Kurzrock, Emory
PMWC Award Ceremony
• Antoni Ribas, UCLA Health (Luminary)
Featured Speakers
• Antoni Ribas, UCLA Health
• Gerold Meinhardt, Daiichi Sankyo
• Katy Rezvani, MD Anderson
• Javad Shahidi, BeOne
• Alicia Zhou, Cancer Research Institute
• Oren Gilad, Aprea Therapeutics
• Adam Palmer, UNC
• Trever Bivona, UCSF
• Laura Volta, Penn Medicine
• Vivek Subbiah, Stanford
• Mark Stewart, Friends of Cancer Research
Precision Immunotherapy After PD-1
Cells, bispecifics, ADCs, and new combination logic after checkpoint failure.
Biomarkers That Matter
Selecting patients for immunotherapy and targeted therapy with decision-grade biomarkers.
Resistance Biology & Adaptive Combination Strategies
How tumors adapt, and how to sequence therapy around that biology.
Which Immune Cells Can Be Programmed In Vivo?
The next wave of immune-cell engineering and where it may matter first.
Rare Cancers, Basket Trials & N-of-1 Playbooks
Moving from histology-agnostic evidence to individualized precision oncology.
Davos of Precision Medicine
PMWC 2027 Program
January 27–29, 2027 · Santa Clara Convention Center
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