William J. Simmons, Ph.D.

Post-doctoral Fellow, Department of Pathology; New York University Medical Center; New York, NY

Education | Research | Publications | Presentations | Professional Affiliations

Education:

William received his B.S. in Molecular Biology and B.A. in English Literature from Long Island University, and M.S. degree in Biology from New York University, and is currently completing his doctoral thesis in the Graduate School of Biological Sciences in the Molecular Pathology and Immunology program at UMDNJ.

He was involved in a collaborative project with Dr. G. J. Thorbecke at New York University School of Medicine and made significant contributions to the understanding of immunity through previous work in her lab. William presently continues a molecular oncology collaboration with Dr. G. Inghirami, also at NYU School of Medicine.

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Research:

I hope to gain a better understanding of the fundamental chemical and biochemical processes central to immunity and elaborate research strategies aimed at modifying aberrant processes contributing to disease.

One project on which I work focuses on immunotherapy for neoplasia. In an in vivo murine model, neoplastic B cells stimulate T cell division and cytokine production that, in turn, support division of the tumor cells. The mechanism by which the neoplastic B cells stimulate host T cells has been described and extended to various models (Figure 1). The paracrine loop represents a potential target for therapeutic intervention and is currently part of our investigation.

FIGURE 1. Northern blots of lymphoma RNA hybridized with different MMTV (the proviral super antigen on neoplastic B cells that stimulates T cells) probes. The patterns obtained with the LTR probe (A) and the env (7136-7339) probe (B) demonstrate the presence of both LTR and env sequences in the 1.8-kb mRNA from the RI strain 1 lymphomas (326 and 340), MA/My lymphoma NJ126, and from the C57L lymphoma (NJ123), similar to the 1.8-kb transcripts of SJL lymphomas (i.e., cRCS2). The env sequences are not present in the 1.8-kb transcripts detected with the LTR probe in normal LPS-activated DBA/2 B cells. Probing with the Mtv7-specific oligonucleotide shows that these 1.8-kb transcripts in lymphomas 326 and 340 are produced by Mtv7 (D). The 1.8-kb mRNAs for MMTV-LTR in SJL (cNJ117 and cRCS-X) and C57L (cNJ123.5) lymphomas, hybridize to the Mtv29-specific oligonucleotide probe (C). Specificity of the oligonucleotide probes is shown by the lack of hybridization of RNA from cRCS-X with the Mtv7 oligonucleotide (D) and of RNA from lymphomas 326 and 340 with the Mtv29 oligonucleotide probe (not shown).

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Publications:

N. Senn*, Simmons W. J.*, Erianne, G., Zhang, D. J., Huang, C., Thomas, R.M., Tsiagbe, V. K., Ponzio, N. M., and Thorbecke, G. J. META controlled env-initiated transcripts encoding superantigens of murine Mtv29 and Mtv7 and their possible role in B cell lymphomagenesis. The Journal of Immunology. 166:5422-5429, May 2001. *Authors contributed equally to this study.

J. Wajchman, Simmons, W.J., Klein, A. and Ponzio, N. Influence of IL-12 on development of cytotoxicity against syngeneic B cell lymphomas of SJL/J mice. Leukemia Research. 26(6):577-590. June, 2002.

R. M. Thomas, D. V. Belsito, C. Huang, I. Ormsby, W. J. Simmons, J. Shaw, T. Doetschman and G. J. Thorbecke. Appearance of Langerhans cells in the epidermis of Tgfbl-/- SCID mice: paracrine and autocrine effects of TGFb-1 and TGFb-2. Journal of Investigative Dermatology. 117(6):1574-1580, December 2001.

W. J. Simmons, M. Simms, R. Chiarle, F. MacKay, V. K. Tsiagbe, J. Browning, G. Inghirami and G. J. Thorbecke. Induction of germinal centers by MMTV encoded superantigen on B cells. Developmental Immunology. 8(3-4):201-11, December 2001.

G. J. Thorbecke, R. Schwartz, J. Leu, C. Huang, and W. J. Simmons. Modulation by cytokines of induction of oral tolerance to type II collagen. Arthritis and Rheumatism 42(1):110-8, January 1999.

L.Z. Chen, G. M. Hochwald, C. Huang, G. Dakin, H. Tao, C. Cheng, W. J. Simmons, G. Dranoff and G. J. Thorbecke. Gene therapy in allergic encephalomyelitis using myelin basic protein specific T cells engineered to express latent transforming growth factor-b1. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 95:12516-12521, October 1998.

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Recent Presentations:

W. J. Simmons, M. Koneru and N. M. Ponzio. IL-12 polarized TH1 cells promote the development of SJL B cell lymphoma-specific cytotoxic effector cells. Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research. 43:5510, 2002.

W. J. Simmons, M. Koneru and N. M. Ponzio. Cancer Immunotherapy with murine tumor specific TH cell clones. Federation of American Societies of Experimental Biology Journal. 16:A507.16, 2002.

W. J. Simmons, M. Koneru, N. M. Ponzio. IL-12 induced effector cells inhibit the growth of syngeneic B cell lymphomas of SJL/J mice. FASEB Journal. Volume 15, Number 4, Part I, March 7, 2001.

W. J. Simmons, K. Haleem, R. Chiarle, G. Inghirami, V. K. Tsiagbe, W. Beamer, G.J. Thorbecke, N. M. Ponzio. Multi-parameter analysis of SWXJ recombinant inbred strains suggest common cross-strain properties of spontaneous germinal center derived lyphomagenesis. FASEB Journal. Volume 15, Number 5, Part II, March 8, 2001.

W. J. Simmons, N. Senn, Erianne, G., Zhang, D.J., Huang, C., Thomas, R.M., Tsiagbe, V.K., Ponzio, N.M., Jaeggli, N. and Thorbecke, G. J. ENV-initiated transcripts encoding superantigens (vSAg29 and vSAg7) in B-cell lymphomas and their role in lymphomagenesis. Federation of American Societies of Experimental Biology Journal. 14:A1014, 2000.

G. J. Thorbecke, W. J. Simmons, Chiarle, R., Jaeggli, N., MacKay, F., Browning, J., Inghirami, G. and Tsiagbe, V.K. Induction of germinal center formation in MMTV-vSAg7 expressing B cells by vSAg7 responsive T cells. Federation of American Societies of Experimental Biology Journal. 14:A1188, 2000.

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Professional Affiliations:

NYU School of Medicine

Sigma Xi

Phi Sigma (Scientific)

New York Academy of Sciences

Sigma Tau Delta (English)

American Association of Immunologists

American Association of Investigative Pathologists

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