ITN Senior Advisor
Dr. Nepom received his bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry from Harvard. He attended the University of Washington, receiving his PhD in Biochemistry in 1977 and his MD in 1978. After post-doctoral work in immunogenetics in the Department of Pathology at Harvard Medical School, he returned to Seattle, joining the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington Medical School Faculty in 1982.
He is a Member of Benaroya Research Institute at Virginia Mason where he served as Director from 1985 to 2015. Dr. Nepom currently serves as a Senior Advisor to the Immune Tolerance Network (ITN), for which he he was Network Director from 2010 to 2022. Dr. Nepom is also past president of FOCIS, the Federation of Clinical Immunology Societies, a world-wide professional organization dedicated to interdisciplinary research and education in translational immunology.
Dr. Nepom's research interests focus on identifying and understanding molecular and genetic mechanisms contributing to triggering of autoimmune disorders, with particular emphasis on autoreactive T cell fate determination. Translational and clinical applications include evaluation of the role of HLA class II genes in the etiology of type I diabetes and rheumatoid arthritis, and use of immunological monitoring tools for predicting disease susceptibility and response to therapy in clinical trials.