Rob Barnes
BME Ph.D. Student
UVA Cancer Center Trainee Fellow (2022-2023)
Rob is a PhD student in the Department of Biomedical Engineering. He grew up in Atlanta, GA and Nashville, TN, and graduated from University of Georgia in Athens, GA in 2015 with a major in Biochemical Engineering.
Prior to joining UVA, Rob worked for Juno Therapeutics in Seattle, WA as a process engineer. He was a member of the Viral Vector Process Development team, and helped design adherent and suspension lentiviral production processes for use in CAR-T therapies.
Rob’s research focuses on tumor immunology. His primary work studies how changes to glycosylation patterns in the tumor microenvironment influence innate immune cell function and interactions with both cancer cells and other immune cells. He hopes to use this information to improve the efficacy of anti-cancer immunotherapies through improved glycoengineering of antibodies and better targeting of glycoprotein interactions.
Outside of lab, Rob spends most of his time skiing, fly fishing, and, when possible, scuba diving.