Select a highlighted state to learn more about the scientists
and projects that Damon Runyon is currently funding.
Scientists by State
California Institute of Technology
Dhiraj Indana, PhD
"Synthetic intercellular signaling circuits for threat sensing and response"
with Michael B. Elowitz, PhD
Stanford University
Mohammad Balood, PhD
"Development and evaluation of T cell receptor (TCR)-based immunotherapy to target pediatric Acute Megakaryoblastic Leukemia"
with Tanja A. Gruber, MD, PhD
Debadrita Bhattacharya, PhD
"Investigating molecular and cellular mechanisms of intra-tumoral heterogeneity in small-cell lung cancer"
with Julien Sage, PhD
Felix C. Boos, PhD
"Inter-organ communication of protein homeostasis stress responses in vertebrate aging"
with Anne Brunet, PhD
Laura Crowley, PhD
"Identifying fibroblast stem cells in organ maintenance, repair, and cancer"
with Mark A. Krasnow, MD, PhD
Daniel J. Delitto, MD, PhD
"Pathogen sensing in fibroblasts restrains antitumor immunity in pancreatic cancer"
with Michael T. Longaker, MD, DSc
Rongxin Fang, PhD
"Developing tools to mechanistically investigate cellular communications in healthy brain and tumors"
Kate M. MacDonald, PhD
"Formation, excision and cytoplasmic export mechanisms for pathological R-loops"
with Karlene A. Cimprich, PhD
David S. Roberts, PhD
"Defining the molecular landscape and native interactome of the Siglec-sialoglycan axis in disease"
with Carolyn R. Bertozzi, PhD
Stanford University School of Medicine
Steven M. Corsello, MD
"Targeting intrinsic immune signaling in pancreatic cancer with small molecule therapeutics"
with Nathanael S. Gray, PhD, and Ronald Levy, MD
Lucia Ichino, PhD
"Mechanisms underlying cis-regulatory rewiring and chromatin reorganization during epithelial to mesenchymal transition"
with Joanna K. Wysocka, PhD
Anita Reddy, PhD
"Elucidating the contributions of diet and exercise on the redox environment of the gut"
with Justin L. Sonnenburg, PhD
Simon Sretenovic, PhD
"High-throughput precision genome editing for dissecting complex traits in yeast and human cell lines"
with Lars M. Steinmetz, PhD
Jakob Wirbel, PhD
"Microbial genome variation in hematopoietic stem-cell transplantation patients"
with Ami S. Bhatt, MD, PhD, and Michael C. Bassik, PhD
The Salk Institute for Biological Studies
Matthew L. Miller, PhD
"Enter and persist: enhancing anti-tumor T-cell infiltration and metabolism in the brain"
with Susan M. Kaech, PhD
University of California, Berkeley
R. Camille Brewer, PhD
"Defining how early-life microbial encounters sculpt the B cell repertoire and shape vaccine responses"
with Gregory M. Barton, PhD
Ben F. Brian, PhD
"Mechanisms and consequences of microbiota-directed immune responses"
with Gregory M. Barton, PhD
Gabriel Cavin-Meza, PhD
"Leveraging polyploid Xenopus to probe spindle adaptation to increases in genome size"
with Rebecca W. Heald, PhD
Carissa Chan, PhD
"Control of gamma delta T cell anticancer activity by bacterial infection"
with Daniel A. Portnoy, PhD
Joshua B. Sheetz, PhD
"Mitochondrial ubiquitylation mechanisms to exploit metabolic vulnerabilities in cancer"
with Michael Rape, PhD
University of California, San Francisco
Sagar Bhattacharya, PhD
"De novo design of protease-activated anticancer proteins"
with William F. DeGrado, PhD
Jonathan Chou, MD, PhD
Defining and exploiting the cancer surfaceome landscape for novel therapeutics
with Jim A. Wells, PhD
Matthew Decker, MD, PhD
"The N-Ras palmitoylation cycle as a therapeutic target in pediatric acute myeloid leukemia"
with Kevin M. Shannon, MD
Rodrigo Gier, PhD
"Targeted chemical aggregation as a general strategy to overcome cancer drug resistance"
with Kevan M. Shokat, PhD
Kashish Jain, PhD
"Spatial mechanical regulation of oncogenic signaling in tumor progression and metastasis"
with Valerie M. Weaver, PhD
Bridget P. Keenan, MD, PhD
Improving outcomes for patients with hepatocellular carcinoma and liver disease by circumventing myeloid cell-mediated suppression
with Matthew H. Spitzer, PhD & Lawrence Fong, MD
Tadashi Manabe, MD, PhD
"Characterization of oncogenic kinase signaling by membraneless cytoplasmic protein granules"
with Trever G. Bivona, MD, PhD
Hannah R. S. Martin, PhD
"Investigating the neural mechanisms that drive skeletal pain"
with David Julius, PhD
David Y. Oh, MD, PhD
"Co-receptors modulating anti-tumor activity of human cytotoxic CD4+ effector cells"
with Lawrence Fong, MD
Philip T. Pauerstein, MD, PhD
"Enhancing immune synapse formation with synthetic adhesion to overcome chimeric antigen receptor-T cell resistance in pediatric B cell malignancies"
with Wendell A. Lim, PhD
Fanglue Peng, PhD
"Humanize CXCL13 expression in mouse to understand lymphoid neogenesis in cancer"
with Jason G. Cyster, PhD
Youngmu (Nick) Shin, PhD
"Exploring phase condensation as a general mechanism for organizing cell-cell communication assemblies"
with Wendell A. Lim, PhD (University of California, San Francisco), and Rohit V. Pappu, PhD (Washington University)
Sue Im Sim, PhD
"Cellular structural biology of an evolutionarily-ancient organizer of cell shape and movement"
with Orion D. Weiner, PhD
Erron W. Titus, MD, PhD
"Engineered cellular fusogens for novel immune effector functions"
with Matthew F. Krummel, PhD
University of Colorado Boulder
Edward M. C. Courvan, PhD
"Functional analysis of post-transcriptional RNA regulation in hypoxic macrophages"
with Roy R. Parker, PhD
The University of Chicago
Alexandra E. Rojek, MD
Leveraging memory-like T-cell phenotypes to improve cellular therapies
with Justin P. Kline, MD
Boston Children's Hospital
Saket Rahul Bagde, PhD
"Integrin a6ß4 in hemidesmosome dynamics: structural and functional insights for tissue homeostasis, organoid growth, and cancer"
with Timothy A. Springer, PhD
Longyue Lily Cao, MD, PhD
"Using hyperactive dendritic cells to generate improved cancer vaccines"
with Jonathan C. Kagan, PhD
Teng Gao, PhD
"Unraveling the cellular and molecular determinants of hematopoietic aging and regeneration in stem cell transplantation"
with Vijay G. Sankaran, MD, PhD
Julia Su Zhou Li, PhD
“Uncovering the link between repetitive DNA, genomic instability, and tumor viruses”
Brigham and Women's Hospital
Rebecca Pasquarelli, PhD
"Investigating novel mechanisms of tumor immune evasion"
with Stephen J. Elledge, PhD
Vignesh Shanmugam, MD
"Uncovering microenvironmental dependencies in follicular lymphoma"
with Todd R. Golub, MD
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
April A. Apfelbaum, PhD
"Investigation of receptor tyrosine kinase-independent mechanisms of FGFR1-mediated oncogenesis in pediatric gliomas"
with Pratiti Bandopadhayay, MBBS, PhD, and Keith L. Ligon, MD, PhD
Sylvan C. Baca, MD, PhD
"Epigenetic drivers of resistance to novel therapies for bladder and kidney cancer"
with Toni K. Choueiri, MD
Kheewoong Baek, PhD
"Expansion of the glueable and degradable targets of IMiD-CRBN"
with Eric S. Fischer, PhD
Wallace A. Bourgeois, MD
"Characterizing mechanisms of resistance to Menin inhibitors in KMT2A-rearranged and NPM1-mutant AML"
with Scott A. Armstrong, MD, PhD
Simone Bruno, PhD
Optimal epigenetic therapies in triple-negative breast cancer
with Franziska Michor, PhD, and Karen Cichowski, PhD
Anders B. Dohlman, PhD
"Identifying the genomic basis for Fusobacterium nucleatum’s colonization of colorectal cancers"
with Matthew L. Meyerson, MD, PhD
Megan L. Insco, MD, PhD
"Targeting cancer-associated aberrant RNA to treat metastatic melanoma"
with F. Stephen Hodi, MD
Costanza Lo Cascio, PhD
"Investigating the neuronal regulation of radioresistance in diffuse midline gliomas"
with Mariella G. Filbin, MD, PhD
James J. Morrow, MD, PhD
"Application of single-cell approaches to investigate the developmental origin and early transformation steps of osteosarcoma"
with Bradley E. Bernstein, MD, PhD
Erin M. Parry, MD, PhD
"Defining follicular lymphoma transformation: molecular basis, detection and therapeutic vulnerabilities"
with Margaret A. Shipp, MD
Srivatsan Raghavan, MD, PhD
Defining and targeting transcriptional drivers of KRAS inhibitor resistance in pancreatic cancer
with William C. Hahn, MD, PhD & Brian M. Wolpin, MD, MPH
Ahmed Roman, PhD
"Signal bottleneck theory for dissecting gene interactions in pancreatic cancer"
with Eliezer M. Van Allen, MD, and Andrew J. Aguirre, MD, PhD
Geoffrey A. Smith, MD, PhD
"Identifying mechanisms of immune evasion in a murine model of osteosarcoma"
with Tyler Jacks, PhD
Mounica Vallurupalli, MD
"Defining the mechanistic implications of SF3B1 mutations in MDS"
with Todd R. Golub, MD
Srinivas R. Viswanathan, MD, PhD
"X marks the spot: exploring how X-chromosome alterations drive sex differences in cancer"
Lara Wahlster, MD, PhD
"Decoding mechanisms of B-acute lymphoblastic leukemia pathogenesis through the lens of genomics"
with Vijay G. Sankaran, MD, PhD
David M. Walter, PhD
"Identifying the selective mechanism behind U2AF1 mutations in lung adenocarcinoma"
with Matthew L. Meyerson, MD, PhD
Lachelle D. Weeks, MD, PhD
"Predicting leukemia risk from peripheral blood smears"
with Benjamin L. Ebert, MD, PhD
Nina Weichert-Leahey, MD
"Elucidating the role of KAT6A and KAT6B in the epigenetic reprogramming of neuroblastoma to enforce neuronal differentiation"
with A. Thomas Look, MD
Harvard Medical School
Erin E. Duffy, PhD
"Activity-dependent changes in RNA stability as a mechanism for synaptic plasticity"
Lucas Farnung, PhD
"Understanding the mechanistic basis of gene expression regulation by MLL complexes in cancers"
Brooke D. Huisman, PhD
"Elucidating the lineage relationships of thymic mimetic cells"
with Diane Mathis, PhD, and Christophe Benoist, MD, PhD
Manuel Osorio Valeriano, PhD
"Molecular and structural basis of gene expression regulation by the nucleosome remodeling and deacetylase (NuRD) complex in human cancer"
with Lucas Farnung, PhD, and Danesh Moazed, PhD
James C. Taggart, PhD
"Mechanistic interrogation of robustness and vulnerability in a bacterial essential gene network"
with Allon M. Klein, PhD, and Johan Paulsson, PhD
Harvard University
Alon Chappleboim, PhD
"Uncovering signaling mechanisms in somitogenesis through high-throughput genetic screens in robust human organoids"
with Sharad Ramanathan, PhD
Massachusetts General Hospital
Charles H. Adelmann, PhD
"Systematic exploration of the organellar and cellular requirements of pigmentation"
with David E. Fisher, MD, PhD
Charles S. Dai, MD
Epigenetically targeting MYC through paradoxical nuclear receptor activation in hormone-dependent malignancies
with Daniel A. Haber, MD, PhD, and Shyamala Maheswaran, PhD
Albert E. Kim, MD
"Using liquid biopsy and MRI to non-invasively identify therapeutic targets for brain metastases"
with Elizabeth R. Gerstner, MD
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Yuxuan Chen, PhD
"Genetic engineering of oncolytic viruses for pyroptosis-accelerated cancer virotherapy"
with Daniel G. Anderson, PhD
Fangtao Chi, PhD
"Understanding how ketone body metabolites influence intestinal stemness, immune responses and tumorigenesis"
with Ömer H. Yilmaz, MD, PhD
Phaedra C. Ghazi, PhD
"Investigating therapeutic vulnerabilities of lung cancer by tracking cellular identity"
with Tyler Jacks, PhD
Jane E. Lodwick, PhD
"Revealing structure and function of an anomalous bacterial secretion system throughout the host cell"
with Rebecca L. Lamason, PhD
Senén D. Mendoza, PhD
"Discovery and characterization of bacterial immunity against RNA phages"
with Michael T. Laub, PhD
Expery O. Omollo, PhD
"Elucidating what determines the strength of bacterial transcription terminators"
with Gene-Wei Li, PhD
Ian J. Roney, PhD
"Discovery and characterization of bacteriophage effectors of bacterial immune systems"
with Michael T. Laub, PhD
The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard
Chaiheon Lee, PhD
"Development of haptenizing chimeras for neoantigen generation"
with Amit Choudhary, PhD
Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research
Jingchuan Luo, PhD
“Decoding the role of localized translation in normal physiology and cancer metastasis”
Ryan Y. Muller, PhD
“The molecular determinants of PABP-mediated gene regulation”
with David P. Bartel, PhD
Princeton University
Hasreet K. Gill, PhD
"Defining mechanisms by which quorum sensing and 3D morphogenesis interact in space and time to drive Vibrio cholerae pellicle maturation"
with Bonnie L. Bassler, PhD
Grace E. Johnson, PhD
"Defining quorum-sensing signaling patterns and their effects on gene expression and morphology in V. cholerae biofilms at the single-cell and community levels"
with Bonnie L. Bassler, PhD
Jeremy A. Owen, PhD
"The biophysics of substrate recognition in chromatin remodeling"
with Tom W. Muir, PhD, and Ned S. Wingreen, PhD
Titas Sengupta, PhD
"Investigating bacterial small RNA-mediated regulation of host behavior"
with Coleen T. Murphy, PhD
Carolina Trenado-Yuste, PhD
"Screening migratory modes and drug delivery schedules in 3D spheroids of triple-negative breast cancer cells"
with Celeste M. Nelson, PhD, and Ned S. Wingreen, PhD
Cheng Yang, PhD
"Developing an activity-based sensing probe for selective monitoring ammonia in cancer"
with Christopher J. Chang, PhD
Columbia University
James Swann, VetMB, DPhil
"Emergency myelopoiesis pathways as common drivers of clonal dominance and disease progression in acute myeloid leukemia"
with Emmanuelle Passegué, PhD
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
Andrew L. Ji, MD
"Dissecting spatial crosstalk in squamous cell carcinoma arising in organ transplant recipients"
with Miriam Merad, MD, PhD
Léa Montégut, PhD
"Targeting age-driven myeloid dysfunction in cancer: unraveling the immunomodulatory and metabolic contributions of GLP-1R agonists"
with Miriam Merad, MD, PhD
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Justin Perry, PhD
"Tumor-macrophage metabolic symbiosis as a driver of disease progression and therapeutic resistance"
Antonio Cuevas-Navarro, PhD
"Elucidating mechanisms that reverse the detrimental effect of RAS mutations in cancer"
with Piro Lito, MD, PhD
Michael V. Gormally, MD, PhD
"Immunologic targeting of 'undruggable' TP53 hotspot mutations through T cell receptor gene therapy"
with Christopher A. Klebanoff, MD, and Michael F. Berger, PhD
Tamar Kavlashvili, PhD
"Developing Tools to Mechanistically Investigate the mtDNA 'Common Deletion'"
with Agnel Sfeir, PhD
Paul C. Klauser, PhD
"Generative artificial intelligence enabling next-generation radiopharmaceuticals"
with Jason S. Lewis, PhD, and Caleb A. Lareau, PhD
Xiaoli Mi, MD
"Origin and evolution of long-lived CAR T cells in patients with hematologic malignancies"
with Omar Abdel-Wahab, MD, and Dan A. Landau, MD, PhD
Nalin Ratnayeke, PhD
"Dissecting heterogeneous cellular responses to oncogenic KRAS inhibition in pancreatic adenocarcinoma"
with Scott W. Lowe, PhD
Ariën Schiepers, PhD
"Regulatory T cells in health and disease: from Foxp3 dependence to resilience and back again"
with Alexander Y. Rudensky, PhD
Denis Torre, PhD
"Dissecting dynamic cellular responses to genetic perturbations using time-resolved single-cell CRISPR screens"
with Danwei Huangfu, PhD, and Thomas Norman, PhD
Santosha A. Vardhana, MD, PhD
"Overcoming metabolic suppression of anti-tumor immunity in gastric cancer"
with Charles L. Sawyers, MD
Memorial Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research
Rico C. Ardy, PhD
"An atlas of fibroblast cell states in health and disease through functional genomics"
with Thomas Norman, PhD
New York Genome Center
Isabella N. Grabski, PhD
"A probabilistic framework for deconvolving causal mechanisms of cancer therapeutics with genetic perturbation screens"
with David A. Knowles, PhD, and Rahul Satija, PhD
The Rockefeller University
Nicole M. Cruz, MD
"Understanding the role of KMT2D in MLL-AF9 acute myeloid leukemia"
with Robert G. Roeder, PhD
University of Pennsylvania
Rahul S. Bhansali, MD
"Investigating chromatin architectural dynamics mediated by LDB1 in T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia"
with Gerd A. Blobel, MD, PhD
Alexander C. Huang, MD
"Shared antigen and neoantigen-specific T cells in checkpoint blockade efficacy and toxicity"
with Gerald P. Linette, MD, PhD
Nicholas P. Lesner, PhD
"Hepatic urea cycle function in NASH-induced HCC progression"
with M. Celeste Simon, PhD
Rebecca S. Moore, PhD
"Investigation of the role of peripheral secreted molecules on sleep and circadian rhythms"
with Amita Sehgal, PhD
Christopher Noetzel, PhD
"How do eukaryotic cells count cell cycles? Intrinsic regulation of quantized asexual replication cycles and commitment to sexual differentiation in the protozoan parasite Cryptosporidium parvum"
with Boris Striepen, PhD
University of Washington
Wei (Will) Chen, PhD
"Decoding the transcription code: de novo protein design for precise gene regulation"
with David Baker, PhD
Nicholas C. Lammers, PhD
"A computational platform for predicting whole-embryo morphologies from single-cell transcriptomes"
with Cole Trapnell, PhD, and David Kimelman, PhD
Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth
Leslie A. Day, PhD
"From tools to tumors: building genetic systems to determine Prevotella's role in cancer"
with George A. O'Toole, PhD
