Dr. Pauken is combining her passion for exhaustion and tolerance, interrogating the mechanisms by which the immune system regulates the balance between protective immunity and immune-driven pathologies. Using mouse models of cancer and autoimmunity, the main goal of her lab is to better understand how PD-1 inhibitors regulate both protective and pathogenic CD8 + T cell responses. Dr. Pauken's long term goal is to develop novel strategies to uncouple the protective effects of immunotherapy from the toxic side effects.