Rate My Professor Silke Neumann

Dr Silke Neumann holds the position of Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine at the University of Otago's Faculty of Medicine. She earned her Bachelor of Pharmacy (BPharm) and PhD from the University of Otago, with her doctoral thesis titled "Long peptide vaccines for the treatment of melanoma," completed in 2014. Initially working in the School of Pharmacy, her research career focuses on the role of inflammation in disease progression, particularly in cancer and stroke. Key interests include immune responses, innate immune cells, stroke immunology and immune therapy, immunotherapy for cancer, and the immunoproteasome in cancer-immune interplay. She employs advanced methods such as cell-based assays and flow cytometric analysis.

Neumann has secured major funding, including the Sir Charles Hercus Fellowship ($599,702, 2023) for "Developing novel targets and drugs for cancer therapy in Aotearoa New Zealand," a Marsden Fund grant ($360,000, 2024) examining molecular mechanisms driving gastric cancer survival, and a Health Research Council Emerging Researcher First Grant ($249,961, 2022) for "Treating gastric cancer according to its biology." Notable publications are "The effects of obesity on anti-cancer immunity and cancer immunotherapy" (Cancers, 2020), "Whole-grain processing and glycemic control in type 2 diabetes: a randomized crossover trial" (Diabetes Care, 2020), and "Activation of the NLRP3 inflammasome is not a feature of all particulate vaccine adjuvants" (Immunology and Cell Biology, 2014). Her research has garnered over 600 citations. She chairs the OMNI Flow Cytometry user group committee, serves as Academic Leader for Flow Cytometry, and supervises postgraduate students.