{"id":1731209,"date":"2025-06-17T11:19:27","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T15:19:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/med.virginia.edu\/faculty\/faculty-listing\/syd3xz\/"},"modified":"2025-06-25T15:28:02","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T19:28:02","slug":"syd3xz","status":"publish","type":"faculty-listing","link":"https:\/\/med.virginia.edu\/faculty\/faculty-listing\/syd3xz\/","title":{"rendered":"Witt, Russell Gardner"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Despite advancements in melanoma treatment with immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) and BRAF-targeted therapy, 40-65% of metastatic melanoma patients do not survive beyond five years. An observed &#8216;obesity paradox&#8217; shows improved survival in obese melanoma patients treated with ICB or BRAF\/MEKi. My lab investigates the role of adipokines released from fat cells in melanoma progression and treatment response. Using murine models, we aim to understand the mechanism underlying the obesity paradox and to identify new therapeutic targets for enhancing melanoma treatment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":1734857,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"otheraff":[],"phd-degree":[2566],"primary":[2324],"research-discipline":[2513,2488,2491,2503,2499,2497],"research-opportunity":[2541,2558,2544],"training-grant":[],"class_list":["post-1731209","faculty-listing","type-faculty-listing","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","phd-degree-phd-experimentalpathology","primary-surgery","research-discipline-biology","research-discipline-cancer-biology","research-discipline-experimental-pathology","research-discipline-immunology","research-discipline-metabolism","research-discipline-translational-science","research-opportunity-ro-cancerbiology","research-opportunity-ro-cancerimmunologyandimmunotherapy","research-opportunity-ro-experimentalpathology"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Witt, Russell Gardner - Research Faculty Directory<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/med.virginia.edu\/faculty\/faculty-listing\/syd3xz\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Witt, Russell Gardner - Research Faculty Directory\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Despite advancements in melanoma treatment with immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) and BRAF-targeted therapy, 40-65% of metastatic melanoma patients do not survive beyond five years. 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