Our laboratory seeks to understand the molecular basis of blood cell formation in health and disease. We focus on defining how cancer-associated mutations impact hematopoietic stem cell function, how they drive disease progression and response to therapy. Our ultimate goal is to develop novel treatments for blood disorders including marrow failure and leukemia.

Hematopoiesis is the continuous production of blood cells that are essential to life. This includes red blood cells that oxygenate our cells, platelets that clot wounds, and white blood cells that fight infections and provide us with life-long immunity. This dynamic process is sustained by a very rare group of cells known as hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). They possess the ability to both self-renew (to make a carbon copy of itself) and differentiate into functional progenies, and this decision is governed by both cell-intrinsic and cell-extrinsic factors. How this fundamental process is regulated at the molecular level is still incompletely understood. Our laboratory seeks to understand how this dynamic balance is regulated by transcriptional and post-transcriptional mechanisms. We hope to find novel treatments to life-threatening blood diseases such as myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), bone marrow failure and acute leukemias.