Dr. Won Jun Kim, Tri-Institutional M.D.-Ph.D. student, was named a winner of the 2026 Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award by the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. The prestigious prize honors the exceptional achievements of graduate students in the biological sciences—recognizing the impact and originality of their research.
The Tri-Institutional M.D.-Ph.D. Program is a joint venture between Weill Cornell Medicine, The Rockefeller University and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, with students earning their doctorate from one of these three institutions and their medical degree from Weill Cornell Medical College. Dr. Kim conducted his Ph.D. research in the laboratory of Dr. Omar Abdel-Wahab at the Gerstner Sloan Kettering Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, where his work focused on developing new T-cell-based immunotherapies in myeloid leukemias.
“Winning the Weintraub Award truly feels surreal. Looking back, I used to struggle with science until I found great teachers who taught me the joy of research and scientific discovery. This honor exemplifies the importance of finding mentors who are willing to take a risk and invest in young trainees like me,” said Dr. Kim, who also thanked his Ph.D. mentor Dr. Abdel-Wahab and colleagues for supporting his work.
In myeloid leukemias, RNA splicing factor mutations are prevalent and result in RNA mis-splicing events that are highly recurrent across patients. Dr. Kim and his collaborators showed that these mis-splicing events are translated into actionable neoantigens— tumor-specific antigens that form on cancer cells due to mutations in the splicing machinery. They pinpointed T-cell receptors (TCRs) that recognize these neoantigens and redirect T-cells to specifically kill cancer cells with splicing factor mutations.
“These findings have clinical significance and therapeutic implications, as the neoantigens and TCRs we identified can be applied to various types of immunotherapies such as TCR-T cell therapy and cancer vaccines,” he said.
Dr. Kim joined the Tri-Institutional M.D.-Ph.D. Program in 2019, completing his doctorate in 2025. He is currently finishing the last two years of his M.D. curriculum at Weill Cornell Medical College.
