Dr Manu Singh - The Westmead Institute for Medical Research

Dr Manu Singh

Laboratory Head, Clonal Evolution in Autoimmunity Laboratory

BSc (Hons), PhD

manu.singh@wimr.org.au

Centre for Immunology and Allergy Research

Clonal Evolution in Autoimmunity Laboratory

Biography

Dr Mandeep (Manu) Singh is an emerging international leader in immunology, genomics and human autoimmunity, and is Head of the Clonal Evolution in Autoimmunity Laboratory at the Westmead Institute for Medical Research. He is also an Adjunct Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Medicine and Health at the University of Sydney. Dr Singh’s research has reshaped our current understanding of how autoimmune diseases arise and persist, positioning him as a leading figure in the emerging field of somatic genomics in autoimmunity, with recent discoveries published in Cell, Immunity, Journal of Autoimmunity and Science Translational Medicine. He completed his PhD at the Australian National University in 2017 and trained at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research and at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York before establishing his independent laboratory at WIMR in 2026. He has secured over $2M AUD in research funding, including an NHMRC Investigator Grant and an Ainsworth 4 Foundation Fellowship in Precision Medicine.
THEMES: Immunology and Inflammation; Genomics and Precision Medicine; Autoimmune Disease

Research interests

Dr Singh’s laboratory is uncovering the fundamental mechanisms that allow pathogenic immune cells to escape immune tolerance and drive human autoimmune disease. His central discovery — that immune cells in patients with autoimmune disease can acquire somatic “driver” mutations of the type usually associated with lymphoma — has opened an entirely new paradigm for understanding how chronic autoimmunity arises and persists. Using single-cell genomic technologies that he has pioneered, his team identifies mutation-bearing immune cells in patients with coeliac disease, type 1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis and other conditions. A major current focus is non-responsive and refractory coeliac disease, which affects up to 30% of patients who fail to improve on a gluten-free diet. By detecting expanded T cell clones carrying lymphoma-driver mutations early in disease, his work aims to deliver the first prognostic biomarkers and precision therapies for this condition.

Immunology, genomics, autoimmune disease, immune tolerance

Adjunct roles

Adjunct Senior Lecturer

Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney

Recent publications

Detecting Somatic Mutations in Rare Clones using Single Cell Multi-Omics

October 2025

Summary

Refractory coeliac disease or something else?

October 2025

Summary

Lymphoma driver mutations at the root of somatic evolution of nerve-damaging autoantibodies in myelin associated glycoprotein neuropathy.

September 2025

Summary

The Somatic Mosaicism across Human Tissues Network.

July 2025

Summary

Expanded T cell clones with lymphoma driver somatic mutations accumulate in refractory celiac disease

May 2025

Summary

Additional information

ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6998-3805

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/manu-singh-976169242/

Projects:

Tracking the evolution of pathogenic cells in celiac disease
The role of somatic driver mutations in treatment-resistant autoimmune diseases

PROJECTS:

Mutant T cell clones as drivers and biomarkers of non-responsive and refractory coeliac
disease;
Somatic mutation landscapes in pathogenic autoantibody-producing B cells in human autoimmunity;
Development of next-generation single-cell multi-omic technologies for the detection of rare disease-driving clones.

Affiliations

The University of Sydney (Adjunct Senior Lecturer); Somatic Mosaicism across Human Tissues (SMaHT) Network; Frontiers in Immunology (Editorial Review Board).