My name is Kiarash Salari, and I am a Postdoctoral Research Scholar in the Yang Laboratory. I joined the lab as a Ph.D. student and spent five years studying the biology of endometrial cancer before graduating in 2025. My research focuses on understanding how the oncogene SETDB1, a histone H3K9 methyltransferase that is frequently overexpressed in endometrial cancer, drives tumor progression. I am particularly interested in the dual role of SETDB1 in promoting cancer growth. My work has shown that SETDB1 supports tumor development through both intrinsic mechanisms within cancer cells and extrinsic mechanisms within the tumor microenvironment. Specifically, I investigated how SETDB1 enhances cancer cell proliferation while simultaneously enabling tumors to evade immune destruction by suppressing anti-tumor immune responses. A long-term goal of the project is to identify therapeutic strategies that target epigenetic drivers of cancer and improve the effectiveness of immunotherapy for patients with gynecologic malignancies.