McAllister Laboratory
Florencia McAllister, M.D.
Principal Investigator
The McAllister Laboratory studies the interplay among the immune system, microbes and tumors' behavior. We are fundamentally interested in understanding how those interactions ultimately determine tumor initiation, progression, therapy responses and metastasis.
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Who we are. What we do.
What we're up to right now
August 2026 - Say what?! Again? Haoyue was awarded an AACR Scholar-in-Training Award. This girl is on a roll!
August 2026 — Haoyue was awarded the first FY26 Immunology Program Achievement Award, and we are so incredibly proud of her and all of her hard work. Congrats!!
July 2026 — PUBLICATION ALERT! Head to our Publications page to take a look at the newest work out of the McAllister Lab.
July 2026 — Welcome back, and congratulations to Giorgia, who is now joining our team as a Research Assistant II!
May 2026 — Haoyue won a(nother) poster award during the Immunology Program Retreat, her third prize to date.
March 2026 — A big congratulations to Dr. Seyda Baydogan for matching into an Internal Medicine residency.
January 2026 — Goodbye (for now) Giorgia. We will miss you!
December 2025 — While we are sad to say goodbye to Sumedha, please join us in saying a hearty hello to our newest postdoctoral fellow, Liang Luo.
November 2025 — Congratulations to Dr. Sumedha, who successfully defended her thesis. We are so proud of you!
November 2025 — As we begrudgingly say goodbye to Leandro, we are happy to say hello to Ilem, rotating resident in research.
October 2025 — Finally, the lab feels whole again; welcome back, Le!
September 2025 — The McAllister lab welcomes not one, but TWO international visiting scientists: Leandro and Giorgia. Welcome to Houston, y'all!
August 2025 — Welcome to Siyeon, our newest rotation student.
June 2025 — Welcome to Luoxi, who joined the lab as a Ph.D. student, and Soham and Ege, our summer students.
May 2025 — Rian graduated after successfully defending her thesis in April.
April 2025 — Welcome to our three newest lab members: Min, Mostafa and Fernando.
March 2025 — Haoyue won a poster award during the Immunology Program Retreat, her second prize to date.
Research Focus
We use a variety of models, depending on the question we are asking. These include genetically engineered or orthotopic mouse models, bone marrow chimeric animals and in vitro interactive modeling systems. We follow the same approach with technologies and use flow cytometry, CyTOF, Immunoplex, single cell sequencing and a variety of imaging methods.
In parallel, our laboratory maintains a human microbial biobank from healthy individuals, cancer patients and high-risk individuals. This resource allows us to determine the translation relevance of our basic findings.
Most Recent Publications
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Tumor microbial burden drives immune responses through regulation of interferon signaling
Cancer Discovery (2026) Opens a new window
Haoyue Liu, Jeong-Hoon Jang, Fuduan Peng, Hajar Rajaei, Vidhi Chandra, Le Li, Dhwani Rupani, Segideh Taghinezhadsaroukalaei, Yuehui Zhao, Erika Y. Faraoni, Thais F. Bartelli, Olivereen Le Roux, Virginia Tahan, Fernando Jimenez-Aracon, Seyda Baydogan, Amir Hossein Mohseni, Javier A. Gomez, Mitesh Patel, Jared K. Burks, Barbara Miño Galvez, Daniel E. Carvajal-Hausdorf, Erika Ruiz-García, Edith A. Fernandez-Figueroa, Scott Kopetz , Steven B. Maron, Andrea Cercek, Erick M. Riquelme, Nicholas E. Navin, James R. White, Linghua Wang , Luis A. Diaz , Florencia McAllister
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Aerobic exercise activates S1PR1 signaling in tumor endothelial cells to promote vascular function in pancreatic cancer
Cancer Research (2026) Opens a new window
Riccardo Ballarò , Truong Lam, Sumedha Pareek, Jonghae Lee, Hetal Patel, Priya Tirumala, Guanshu Liu, Karma Hayek, Hannah Savage, Ryan De Maleki, Bella S. Guerrouahen, An Ngo-Huang, Nathan H. Parker, Matthew H.G. Katz, Maria Q. Petzel, Florencia McAllister, Robin D. Wright, Retty A. Roy, Ruben G. Abraham, Keyan Pezeshki, Lin Tan, Philip L. Lorenzi, Keri L. Schadler
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Whole metagenomic profiling identifies a gut microbial signature for chronic pancreatitis via machine learning
Pancreas (2026); 55(5):p e458-e468 Opens a new window
Thais F. Bartelli, Seyda Baydogan, Ismet Sahin, Kristi L. Hoffman, Joseph Petrosino, Kyle W. Blackburn, Jing Zhao, Amy Wood, Tulin Ayvaz, Anil Surathu, Martha Navarro Cagigas, Erick Carrasco Barcenas, Tomera Mata, Vincent Kim Nguyen, Alejandro Zulbaran-Rojas, Le Li, Erika Y. Faraoni, James R. White, Nadim Ajami, Liang Li, Dhiraj Yadav, Darwin L. Conwell, Jose Serrano, Stephen J. Pandol, Evan L. Fogel, Stephen K. Van Den Eden, Santhi Swaroop Vege, Mark D. Topazian, Walter G. Park, Phil A. Hart, Chris Forsmark, Melena D. Bellin, Anirban Maitra, Manoop S. Bhutani, Michael Kim, George Van Buren, William E. Fisher, Florencia McAllister
Lab Members
Learn more about our current lab members, their various interests in the lab and their hobbies outside of the lab. Also take a peek at the McAllister Lab alumni and what they are doing today.
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Research Areas
Find out about the four types of research taking place at UT MD Anderson.