Gay M. Crooks MD

Gay Crooks, MD, is a Professor and the Rebecca Smith Chair in the Departments of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and Pediatrics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. She also serves as Director of the immunology, inflammation, infection and transplantation research theme at UCLA, as well as Director of the Cancer and Stem Cell Biology Program of the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center.
The research focus of the Crooks Lab is informed by her clinical role as a pediatric hematopoietic stem cell transplant physician and encompasses three related areas of interest: manipulation of T-cell differentiation from human hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) and pluripotent stem cells for cancer immunotherapy; cellular and molecular characterization of HSC and early lymphoid development; and mechanisms of growth and differentiation of the thymic microenvironment during development.

Dr. Crooks holds an MD from the University of Western Australia. She completed her fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians in pediatrics at Princess Margaret Hospital for Children in Perth.