Matthias Eyrich

Born in Friedrichshafen, Germany, Matthias Eyrich began his medical education at the University of Ulm in 1989. After an internship at the Ben Gurion University, BeerSheva and the Hadassah Medical School, Jerusalem he finished his studies in 1996, and completed his medical education 1997 with the defense of his MD thesis in experimental endocrinology in the lab of Ernst-Friedrich Pfeiffer, Ulm. During his medical training pediatric oncology had gained his particular attention, therefore he started residency in pediatrics at the University Children’s Hospital Tübingen in 1996 under the mentoring of Dietrich Niethammer. Understanding the interactions between cancer and immune cells was his main research interest from the beginning, and immediately after residency he began a post-doctoral fellowship in the lab of Paul Gerhardt Schlegel at the University Children’s Hospital Tübingen investigating the patterns of immune reconstution after haploidentical stem cell transplantation with a special emphasis on the development of the αβ TCR repertoire and thymic function. Another project investigated the organ tropism of GvH-reactive T-cells in a mouse allotransplantation model across minor histocompatibility antigens. Clinically, he completed a fellowship training program in pediatrics including neonatology, intensive care, neuropediatrics and pediatric oncology&stem cell transplanation, and received board certification as a pediatrician in 2004. Realizing the need for translational research, he became involved in the GMP-manufacturing of cellular immunotherapeutic products. In 2004, he spent a four month fellowship at the Institut Pasteur, Paris in the former lab of Philippe Kourilsky to learn new techniques of TCR sequencing and clonality assessment. In 2004, he moved to the University Children’s Hospital Würzburg to build up – together with Paul Gerhardt Schlegel – a new unit for pediatric stem cell transplantation and cellular therapy. In 2006 he received board certification as a pediatric hemato-oncologist and in 2007 the venia legendi (habilitation) in pediatrics. He served as a senior consultant of the stem cell transplantation unit and head of the GMP-facility from 2005-2009. In 2009 he was appointed endowed professor of experimental and clinical cellular therapy, and in 2014 ordinary professor (W2) for cellular therapy. Besides serving as a senior consultant in pediatric oncology, he developed several GMP-grade cellular products such as TCRαβ-depleted stem cells, sorted memory T-cells, veto T cells for graft facilitation, DCs for vaccination purposes and brought them either into medical routine or clinical trials. In addition to participating in numerous clinical trials using advanced stem cell transplantation products, bispecific antibodies and checkpoint inhibitors in ALL and solid tumors, he initiated as principal investigator a multicenter Phase I/II trial investigating therapeutic vaccines in children with relapsed gliomas (HIT-HGG Rez Immunovac). Besides these clinical activities, his most recent research focusses on refining and personalizing vaccination targets by ligandome analysis of pediatric solid tumors and targeting multiple minor histocompatibility antigens.