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Linzixuan (Rhoda) Zhang holding the medal she won in the 2024 Collegiate Inventors Competition

Rhoda Zhang Wins 2024 Collegiate Inventors Competition

MIT News

November 5, 2024

Graduate student Linzixuan (Rhoda) Zhang has won the 2024 Collegiate Inventors Competition in both the Graduate and People's Choice categories. With advisors Robert Langer and Ana Jaklenec, Zhang and KI postdoc Xin Yang are developing metal-organic frameworks and other safe, sustainable nutrient stabilizing materials to address global micronutrient deficiencies. They are also launching MOFe™ Coffee, the first iron-fortified coffee.

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Diet, Cancer, and the Microbiome

Cell Stem Cell

September 15, 2021

Over the years, researchers in the laboratory of Ömer Yilmaz have uncovered important clues into the connections between diet and cancer, with recent work focusing on the role of intestinal stem cells on tumor initiation under various dietary conditions. In a study published in Cell Stem Cell, the lab examines the impact of high fat diets on gut microbes and their interactions with both stem cells and immune cells. The findings suggest that such perturbations to the microbiome significantly dampen immune recognition of premalignant intestinal stem cells, leading to increased tumorigenesis.

Copy That

MIT News

September 15, 2021

Griffith Lab researchers have developed a new way to grow tiny replicas of the pancreas. These “organoids,” described in Nature Materials, can be grown from healthy or cancerous cells and could help researchers develop and test potential drugs for pancreatic cancer—one of the most difficult types of cancer to treat.

Lees Named Associate Dean

MIT News

August 17, 2021

KI associate director and Virginia & D.K. Ludwig Professor for Cancer Research Jacqueline Lees has been appointed associate dean in the MIT School of Science. Lees, along with John W. Jarve (1978) Professor in Brain and Cognitive Sciences Rebecca Saxe, will contribute to the school's diversity, equity, and inclusion activities, as well as develop and implement mentoring and other career-development programs to support the community. This work is well aligned with Lees' longstanding leadership at both the Koch Institute and MIT's Department of Biology, and her ongoing commitment to making discovery science research accessible to all.

MIRA MIRA on the Cell

MIT News

August 16, 2021

Congratulations to chemical engineer Katie Galloway on receipt of the Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (MIRA) from the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of General Medical Sciences. This prestigious award will support Galloway’s molecular systems biology work to develop multi-scale tools and approaches for understanding and engineering cell-fate transitions in development, reprogramming, and cancer. 

Fighting Health Disparities with Nanomedicine

MIT Koch Institute

August 7, 2021

Congratulations to Institute Professor and KI member Paula Hammond, the inaugural recipient of the Black in Cancer Distinguished Investigator Award. Established through a partnership between Black in Cancer and the Emerald Foundation in response to racial abuse experienced by Black birdwatcher Chris Cooper in Central Park last year, this award recognizes Black excellence in cancer research and medicine. With this support, Hammond will apply her signature layer-by-layer technology—variations on which were recently featured in National Geographic and The Wall Street Journal—to engineer a nanoscale delivery system that direct a combination of chemotherapy and immunotherapy to ovarian cancer cells and the surrounding tumor microenvironment. Although the incidence rate of high grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSOC) is higher in white than black women, the mortality rate is higher for black women, making Hammond's approach a powerful tool for combating serious health disparities.

Three Strikes Against Pancreatic Cancer

MIT News

August 5, 2021

Jacks Lab investigations published in Cancer Cell have identified a promising three-drug combination to improve pancreatic tumors’ response to immunotherapy. The team now seeks to analyze which tumors will respond best to this approach and is working with the Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research and two pharmaceutical companies to test the combination therapy in clinical trials.

Inside Outreach

American Society for Cell Biology

August 2, 2021

KI outreach manager Erika Reinfeld sat down with KI postdoc and American Society for Cell Biology representative Tim Fessenden to discuss science outreach before and after Covid. Reflecting on the nature of online vs. in-person events, tours, and presentations, the conversation examined the pandemic’s impact on access, equity, and opportunity, as well as strategies for connecting STEM topics to people’s everyday experiences.
 

One Step at a Time

American Association for Cancer Research

July 27, 2021

Cancer metabolism pioneer Matthew Vander Heiden didn't set out to be a pioneer; he just wanted to understand how mitochondria worked. However, one question led to another and he soon found himself revisiting fundamental questions about cell metabolism and applying his discoveries to cancer biology. Now, as director of the Koch Institute, Vander Heiden continues to catalyze discoveries and interactions across the cancer research field.

Suono Bio Makes Waves

MIT News

July 27, 2021

KI startup Suono Bio is teaching an old technology new tricks. Beginning with treatment for ulcerative colitis, the team is using ultrasound waves to enhance drug delivery and promote localized absorption into the GI tract. Such an approach could one day make cancer therapy more precise and effective.

Staking Out Cancer

MIT News

July 23, 2021

Bhatia Lab engineers, in collaboration with biologists in the Gertler Lab, have created diagnostic nanoparticles that detect cancer cells and pinpoint their location anywhere in the body. A study published in Nature Materials tracked the progression and spread of metastatic colon cancer in mouse models before and after chemotherapy, suggesting that the platform could be used to diagnose and monitor cancer, as well as evaluate treatment response. The team is optimistic about the new platform's eventual use as a routine screening tool in annual health exams.

This project was supported in part by the Marble Center for Cancer Nanomedicine and a KI Quinquennial Cancer Research Fellowship, with earlier work supported by the Koch Institute Frontier Research Program.