Nicola J Mason

About

Nicola J Mason is a professor in the Faculty of Biomedical Graduate Studies at the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania. She holds a B.Vet.Med degree from the University of London and a PhD in Immunology from the University of Pennsylvania. Her translational research program focuses on a comparative approach utilizing immunologically intact, canine patients with spontaneous cancer to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of next-generation immunotherapies. This approach aims to accelerate the translation of promising pre-clinical discoveries into human clinical applications. Dr. Mason's lab is actively involved in developing the canine model for evaluating CAR T cell therapies, translating strategies from lab and murine models into client-owned dogs suffering from lymphoma, osteosarcoma, and hemangiosarcoma. She leads clinical trials assessing immune-based therapies, including a recombinant Listeria vaccine to prevent metastatic disease in dogs with osteosarcoma, and coordinates the Canine Cancer Immunotherapy Trials as part of the Cancer Moonshot program. Her extensive experience includes methodologies for expanding and genetically modifying canine T cells ex vivo and conducting clinical trials using CART cells in dogs with B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma, performed at the University of Pennsylvania Veterinary Hospital.

Research topics

• Medicine
• Biology
• Immunology
• Cancer research
• Internal medicine

Selected publications

• Veterinary <scp>Cooperative</scp> Oncology Group—Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (<scp>VCOG‐CTCAE</scp> v2) following investigational therapy in dogs and cats

  Veterinary and Comparative Oncology · 2021-01-15 · 320 citations

  articleOpen access

  The updated VCOG-CTCAE v2 guidelines contain several important updates and additions since the last update (v1.1) was released in 2011 and published within Veterinary and Comparative Oncology in 2016. As the Veterinary Cooperative Oncology Group (VCOG) is no longer an active entity, the original authors and contributors to the VCOG-CTCAE v1.0 and v1.1 were consulted for input, and additional co-authors sought for expansion and refinement of the adverse event (AE) categories. VCOG-CTCAE v2 includ…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Molecular subtypes in canine hemangiosarcoma reveal similarities with human angiosarcoma

  PLoS ONE · 2020-03-25 · 55 citations

  articleOpen access

  Angiosarcoma (AS) is a rare neoplasm with limited treatment options and a poor survival rate. Development of effective therapies is hindered by the rarity of this disease. Dogs spontaneously develop hemangiosarcoma (HSA), a common, histologically similar neoplasm. Metastatic disease occurs rapidly and despite chemotherapy, most dogs die several months after diagnosis. These features suggest that HSA might provide a tractable model to test experimental therapies in clinical trials. We previously…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Development and pharmacokinetic assessment of a fully canine anti-PD-1 monoclonal antibody for comparative translational research in dogs with spontaneous tumors

  mAbs · 2023-12-04 · 22 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  reversed the inhibitory effects of cPD-1:cPD-L1 interaction on canine chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell function. In vivo administration showed no toxicity and revealed favorable pharmacokinetics for a reasonable dosing schedule. These results pave the way for clinical trials with anti-cPD-1 in canine cancer patients to investigate predictive biomarkers and combination regimens to inform human clinical trials and bring a promising checkpoint inhibitor into the veterinary armamentarium.

  PublisherDOI

• Unedited allogeneic iNKT cells show extended persistence in MHC-mismatched canine recipients

  Cell Reports Medicine · 2023-10-01 · 21 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Allogeneic invariant natural killer T cells (allo-iNKTs) induce clinical remission in patients with otherwise incurable cancers and COVID-19-related acute respiratory failure. However, their functionality is inconsistent among individuals, and they become rapidly undetectable after infusion, raising concerns over rejection and limited therapeutic potential. We validate a strategy to promote allo-iNKT persistence in dogs, an established large-animal model for novel cellular therapies. We identify…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Immunological responses and clinical outcomes in dogs with osteosarcoma receiving standard therapy and a Listeria vaccine expressing HER2

  Molecular Therapy · 2025-02-15 · 9 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Translating cellular immunotherapies for autoimmunity to canine clinical trials

  NIH · $4.0M · 2018–2024

• NIH Grant K08AI050827

  NIH · $380k · 2005

Frequent coauthors

• Anita Gaurnier-Hausser

  32 shared

• Christina Coughlin

  21 shared

• Albert S. Baldwin

  20 shared

• Michael J. May

  University of Pennsylvania

  19 shared

• Reema Patel

  National Institutes of Health Clinical Center

  19 shared

• Avery D. Posey

  University of Pennsylvania

  18 shared

• Matthew J. Atherton

  University of Pennsylvania

  17 shared

• Josephine S. Gnanandarajah

  14 shared

Education

• Post-doctoral fellow, Abramson Family Cancer Research Institute

  University of Pennsylvania

  2006

• Resident in Internal Medicine, Clinical Sciences and Advanced Medicine

  University of Pennsylvania

  1997

• B.Vet.Med., Royal Veterinary College, University of London

  University of Pennsylvania

  1992

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