WHITEHEAD - Key Persons
The Raguram Lab studies how to deliver therapeutic molecules into cells within the body.
The Hamilos lab uses a variety of approaches - including electrophysiology, optogenetics, machine learning and computational modeling - to study the neural circuits disrupted in neurological and psychiatric disease.
The Jain Lab studies how biomolecules in a cell self-organize. Specifically, they focus on how membrane-free cellular compartments like RNA granules form and function, and how these structures contribute to human disease.
Brad Wierbowski is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Member David Bartel's lab studying the turnover of messenger RNAs. We sat down with Brad to learn more about him and his experiences in and out of the lab.
d'Arbeloff is the first woman to have obtained a mechanical engineering degree from Stanford University and one of the first women to earn an S.M. degree from MIT. She became a mechanical engineer in the aircraft and space industries, contributing to the design of the Redstone ballistic missile...
Job Titles:
- Director of Intellectual Property & Sponsored Programs
Job Titles:
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator
Catherine Dulac is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, Higgins Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology and Lee and Ezpeleta Professor of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University. Dr. Dulac grew up in Montpellier, France, graduated from the Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, and...
Job Titles:
- Facilities Engineering Manager
Franklin is chairman and former CEO of Acadian Asset Management, a $100 billion institutional asset management firm that he co-founded in 1986. Before joining Acadian, Franklin was assistant treasurer of Thermo Electron Corporation (now Thermo Fisher Scientific,...
The Weiskopf lab studies how immune cells can be used to fight cancer in the body.
Asaf Maoz is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Valhalla Fellow Kipp Weiskopf's lab studying new immunotherapy strategies to treat cancer. He is also a clinical fellow in medical oncology at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute and Mass General Hospital. We sat down with Asaf to learn more about him and his experiences in and out of the lab.
Job Titles:
- Interim Director of Information Technology
Dan Littman's laboratory has made multiple contributions towards our understanding of mechanisms that promote immune system development and contribution to physiological homeostasis, particularly through interactions with microbiota and with cells of the peripheral and central nervous systems. He...
The Bartel Lab studies how cells regulate gene expression by changing the stability or translation of mRNAs
Whitehead Institute Member David Bartel and colleagues uncover how RNA translation into protein is regulated during early development, when genes are turned off and not making new RNA.
Job Titles:
- Director
- Member / Research Areas
The Page Lab studies the genetic differences between males and females and the biological and medical ramifications of these differences.
Whitehead Institute Member David Page and colleagues show that the X and Y chromosomes play a shared role as gene regulators. Genes on the sex chromosomes regulate thousands of genes on other chromosomes, affecting their expression throughout the body.
David C. Page succeeded Lindquist as director, leading the Institute into the post-genomic era. Page, who was the first Whitehead Fellow and became a Member in 1988, served as director from 2005 through June 2020. During his tenure, he made a mark on all facets of the Institute. Notably, he oversaw creation of the Intellectual Property Office; strengthened core facilities; established new platforms, such as the Metabolomics Center; and enhanced the leadership structure by appointing three associate directors. Perhaps most important, he guided a robust renewal of faculty and helped prepare the organization for generational change in its senior membership-with nine Institute Members being appointed under his leadership (along with 14 Whitehead Fellows). In July 2020, Page returned his full focus to research on the role of sex chromosomes in health and disease, which holds the potential to fundamentally improve the practice of medicine.
David Sabatini receives awards for discovery of mTOR proteins
Member David Sabatini received an unprecedented series of awards recognizing his discovery of the mTOR protein and his ongoing achievements in elucidating the mTOR pathway and its relationship to metabolism, aging, and cancer. The awards included the 2017 Lurie Prize in Biomedical Sciences from the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health, the 2019 Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize, and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Sjöberg Prize for 2020.
Langer has held executive, operating, and governance roles in start-up and established biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, for more than three decades. Under his leadership, those organizations developed and/or commercialized more than 60 products....
Job Titles:
- Director of Human Resources and Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Officer
Job Titles:
- Huntington Sheldon Professor
Dr. Geraldine Seydoux is the Huntington Sheldon Professor in Medical Discovery in the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Her work examines how early embryos develop into complex...
Job Titles:
- Career Development Professor of Tissue Engineering, MIT
Gavin Schlissel is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Member Pulin Li's lab studying cell signaling and how proteins move between cells. We sat down with Gavin to learn more about him and his experiences in and out of the lab.
Job Titles:
- Founding Member
- Master of the Opening Game
- Member / Research Areas
Whitehead Institute Founding Member Gerry Fink's creative use of genetics, biochemistry, and molecular biology has yielded fundamental discoveries in biology. His lab has pioneered a better understanding of gene regulation, mutation, and recombination in all organisms. Fink's seminal contributions to the field include his development of a technique for "transforming" yeast that allowed researchers to introduce a foreign piece of DNA into yeast cells and control the inheritance and expression of that DNA. This technique laid the groundwork for the commercial use of yeast as biological factories for manufacturing vaccines and other drugs and set the stage for similar manipulations in more complex organisms.
Master of the opening game: Gerald Fink reflects on his first 50 years in science
Gerald R. Fink succeeded Baltimore as director. During his tenure (which lasted until 2001), he implemented a strategic plan designed to respond to dramatic shifts in the practice of biomedical science and to continue supporting new ideas at the very earliest stage of development-taking a chance on brilliant young scientists eager to extend the boundaries of their chosen fields. And he led planning for a state-of-the-art research wing with expanded biologic containment laboratories for research on HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, common fungal diseases and bacterial infections; and increased space for young Whitehead faculty who were rapidly becoming leaders in their respective fields. In 2001, Fink returned his full-time focus to his lab and continued to make important discoveries on topics such as pathogenic fungi, hormone signaling, and RNA biology. He also served as president of the Genetics Society of America and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Harmit Malik got his BTech, Chemical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, India where he first became interested in molecular biology and selfish genes. He moved to the US to get his PhD in Biology studying Drosophila retrotransposons at the University of Rochester, NY, under the mentorship...
Job Titles:
- Graduate Student Award, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center ( 2023 )
- Graduate Student Award, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center ( 2014 )
Job Titles:
- Graduate Student Award, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center ( 2003 )
Job Titles:
- Founding Member
- Principal Investigator
Whitehead Institute Founding Member Harvey Lodish was co-recipient of the 2021 MITx Prize for Teaching and Learning in MOOCs, and Whitehead Institute Member Sebastian Lourido has been named as one of the Burroughs Wellcome Fund's 2021 Investigators in the Pathogenesis of Infectious Disease.
Founding Member Harvey Lodish has been twice honored by the international science community for his path-breaking scientific accomplishments and intellectual leadership.
Job Titles:
- Chairman in Biomedical Research
Job Titles:
- Medical Institute ( HHMI ) Early Career Scientist
- Medical Institute Medical Research Fellow, 2014
- Professor of Biology, MIT
The Cheeseman Lab studies the molecular players involved in chromosome segregation and cell division.
Whitehead Institute Member Iain Cheeseman and colleagues found that the key factor in determining the assembly location of the kinetochore-a cellular machine that helps distribute chromosomes during cell division-is the local concentration of kinetochore proteins.
Job Titles:
- Director of Facilities Management and Environmental Health & Safety
Joanna Wysocka, Ph.D. is a Lorry Lokey Professor in the Department of Chemical and Systems Biology and the Department of Developmental Biology at Stanford University, a Member of the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine and an HHMI Investigator. Wysocka did her Ph.D....
Goldstein earned three degrees from MIT-bachelor's degrees in chemical engineering and in biology, and a master's in biochemical engineering-during which time he performed research in the lab of founding director David Baltimore. Subsequently, he earned an MBA from Harvard Business School...
The Weissman Lab studies how proteins fold in the cell and how this process can go awry, causing disease. The lab also builds innovative tools for exploring organizational principles of biological systems including ribosome profiling, which globally monitors protein translation, and CRISPRi/a for controlling the expression of human genes and rewiring the epigenome.
Whitehead Institute Member Jonathan Weissman and colleagues used large-scale systematic genetic screens to identify the molecules and pathways that populate the mitochondrial surface with important and diverse signaling proteins. They deciphered the logic by which the cell ensures the proper delivery of these proteins. These findings may have important implications for understanding the impact on health and disease when these processes go awry.
Whitehead Institute Member Jonathan Weissman and collaborators developed a tool to reconstruct the family trees and individual states of cells in humans, revealing how blood cell production changes in old age.
Jullien Flynn is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Member Yukiko Yamashita's lab studying satellite DNA and its potential links to disease. We sat down with Jullien to learn more about her and her experiences in and out of the lab.
Job Titles:
- Researcher
- Research Assistant in the Lab of Whitehead Institute Member Siniša Hrvatin
Kathrin (Kat) Kajderowicz, a research assistant in the lab of Whitehead Institute Member Siniša Hrvatin and graduate student at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been named a recipient of a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans.
Job Titles:
- Procurement & Sourcing Manager
A graduate of Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Vanderbilt Medical School in Nashville, Kevin Churchwell completed his pediatric residency and a clinical fellowship in Pediatric Critical Care at Boston Children's Hospital. Churchwell became Boston Children's President and CEO in March 2021,...
Job Titles:
- Chief Financial Officer
- Treasurer
Laura Sander is a financial professional who has worked in the nonprofit, for-profit, and public sectors with a focus on higher education and the nonprofit sector. She returned to the position of chief financial officer and treasurer at Whitehead Institute in 2023 after previously...
Job Titles:
- Manager of Technology Support Services
The Backman Lab studies the structure and biochemistry of proteins in anaerobic bacteria that are abundant in the human microbiome.
Job Titles:
- Director of Strategic Communications
Job Titles:
- Director of Procurement & Special Projects
Lapman founded Cooper Lapman Financial, LLC in 2009 to provide financial planning and investment management services to individuals and families. After almost 14 years of successful service to its clients, Cooper Lapman Financial merged with The Colony Group in early 2023. Previously, he was...
Mark Greenwood is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Member Pulin Li's lab studying hormone signaling. We sat down with Mark to learn more about him and his experiences in and out of the lab.
Job Titles:
- Chief Operating Officer
- Vice President
Martin Mullins joined Whitehead Institute in June 2007 as vice president, responsible for leadership, management and organization of the Institute's administrative operations and affairs. He brings to the Institute more than thirty-five years of progressive management experience in pharmaceutical,...
Job Titles:
- Administrative Lab Manager
The Gehring Lab studies plant epigenetics - the heritable information that influences cellular function but is not encoded in the DNA sequence itself.
Job Titles:
- Manager Adv Operations & Donor Relations
Job Titles:
- Manager of Science Communications
Michael Chambers is the founding CEO of Aldevron, a company that specializes in nucleic acid, protein, and enzyme production and that has developed novel quality systems and technologies to accelerate the genetic medicine sector. The company was acquired by Danaher for $9.6 billion in 2021,...
Job Titles:
- Manager of Financial Planning and Analysis
Whitehead Institute Member Olivia Corradin and colleagues have developed a system to find patterns in seemingly random differences between the genomes of people affected and unaffected by a disease. They can use these patterns to identify genes that contribute to complex diseases and disorders, such as opioid use disorder.
Job Titles:
- Associate Director of Environmental Health & Safety
Job Titles:
- Manager of Business Information Systems
Pavana Rotti is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Member Olivia Corradin's lab studying the neurobiology of opioid use disorder. We sat down with Pavana to learn more about her and her experiences in and out of the lab.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Institute Board
Peter Whitehead is a lifetime member of the Institute board. He currently serves as a member of its Ad Hoc, Finance and Investment Committees.
Phillip A. Sharp is an Institute Professor (highest academic rank) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and member of the Department of Biology and the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. He joined the Center for Cancer Research (now the Koch Institute) in 1974 and served as its...
The Li Lab studies how circuits of interacting genes in individual cells enable cell-cell communication and multicellular functions.
Whitehead Institute Member Pulin Li has been selected by The Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group to be an Allen Distinguished Investigator. The Allen Distinguished Investigator program backs creative, early-stage research projects in biology and medical research that would not otherwise be supported by traditional research funding programs. Each Allen Distinguished Investigator award provides three years of research funding.
Job Titles:
- Managing Director at Abrams Capital
Raja H. R. Bobbili is a Managing Director at Abrams Capital, an investment firm based in Boston. At Abrams Capital, Bobbili helps lead investments across a range of industries and asset classes. He previously worked at McKinsey & Company as a management consultant. Born in India and raised in...
The Young laboratory studies regulation of gene expression in health and disease.
Job Titles:
- Founding Member
- Member / Research Areas
The Weinberg Lab studies the processes by which cancer cells invade and metastasize.
Robert Weinberg receives the National Medal of Science
Founding Member Robert Weinberg received the National Medal of Science for his pioneering work on cancer genetics, including his discoveries of the first human oncogene-a gene that causes normal cells to form tumors-and the first tumor suppressor gene. His current work primarily focuses on the interactions between epithelial and mesenchymal cells that produce carcinomas and on the processes by which cancer cells invade and metastasize.
Langer, one of 11 Institute Professors at MIT, is one of the most respected researchers in the world and the most cited engineer in history. He has written more than 1,500 articles and has more than 1,400 issued and pending...
Robert Satcher earned bachelor's and PhD degrees in chemical engineering from MIT and an MD from Harvard Medical School. He is an associate professor of orthopaedic oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston (MDACC), where he specializes in the treatment of skeletal...
Job Titles:
- Director of Information Technology Special Projects
Job Titles:
- Founding Member
- Member / Research Areas
Rudolf Jaenisch's lab studies the genetic and epigenetic basis of diseases such as Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, autism and cancer.
Jaenisch, a Whitehead Institute Founding Member and National Medal of Science recipient, received his doctorate in medicine from the University of Munich in 1967 in the lab of German phage researcher P. H. Hofschneider. Before coming to Whitehead, he was head of the Department of Tumor Virology at the Heinrich Pette Institute at the University of Hamburg. He has co-authored more than 500 research papers and has received numerous prizes and recognitions, including an appointment to the National Academy of Sciences in 2003.
Whitehead Institute Founding Member Rudolf Jaenisch and colleagues found that SARS-Cov-2 can infect sensory neurons and alter their gene expression. This may help to explain the peripheral nervous system symptoms associated with Covid-19, such as loss of smell.
Rudolf Jaenisch receives the National Medal of Science
Founding Member Rudolf Jaenisch received the National Medal of Science for improving our understanding of epigenetic regulation of gene expression: the biological mechanisms that affect how genetic information is variably expressed. His work has led to major advances in our understanding of mammalian cloning and embryonic stem cells. His current work focuses on understanding the epigenetic regulation of gene expression in mammalian development and diseases, including Parkinson's, autism spectrum disorders, and Rett and Fragile X syndromes; and his lab has used patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells to develop sophisticated models of conditions, such as Alzheimer's disease and diabetes.
Job Titles:
- Director
- President
- Credit / Gretchen Ertl
The Lehmann Lab studies the biological origins of germ cells, and how they transmit the potential to build a completely new organism to their offspring.
Ruth Lehmann, world-renowned developmental and cell biologist, is Whitehead Institute's fifth director. She leads all aspects of the Institute, championing scientific discovery in a research environment that not only supports, but encourages risk taking, while fostering and supporting a culture of inclusion and excellence.
A globally respected developmental and cell biology researcher, Lehmann is the fifth director of Whitehead Institute and professor of biology at MIT. She previously served as an Institute Member and MIT faculty member from 1988 to 1996, before beginning a...
Ruth Lehmann is the director of the Whitehead Institute and a world-renowned cell and developmental geneticist whose work focuses on reproduction and maternal to embryo inheritance. She has served as director since July 2020. Previously, Lehmann was the Director of the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular...
Ruth Lehmann, a world renowned developmental and cell biologist, succeeded Page as director. Previously, Lehmann was the Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Professor of Cell Biology and Chair of the Department of Cell Biology at New York University (NYU), where she also directed the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine and The Helen L. and Martin S. Kimmel Center for Stem Cell Biology. She was also an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The appointment represented a homecoming: Lehmann was a Whitehead Institute Member from 1988 to 1996, before beginning her distinguished 24-year career at NYU. In announcing Lehmann's appointment, Charles D. Ellis, then-chair of the Whitehead Institute board of directors observed, "Ruth Lehmann perfectly fits our vision for the next director: an eminent scientist and experienced leader, who is passionately committed to Whitehead Institute's mission and possesses a compelling vision for basic biomedical research in the coming decade."
Ruth Lehmann, a world renowned developmental and cell biology researcher, took over as Whitehead Institute's fifth Director in 2020.
Since January 2023, Sally Kornbluth has served as MIT's 18th president. In her Inaugural address, she urged the MIT community to tackle the interlocking challenges the world faces today, especially...
Job Titles:
- Biology Young Investigator
Job Titles:
- Chairman
- Chairman of the Board of Directors
- CEO of FCLTGlobal
In summer of 2020, Whitehead Institute board of directors elected Sarah Keohane Williamson as its next chair. Williamson is CEO of FCLTGlobal, a not-for-profit working to increase innovation, economic growth, and savings by encouraging long-term behaviors in business and investing. She possesses three decades' experience in leadership and management, and has built extensive working relationships with business leaders around the globe. Williamson succeeds Charles D. Ellis, the founder of international strategy consulting firm Greenwich Associates and a prolific author, who has served as chair since 2006.
Whitehead Institute Member Sebastian Lourido and colleagues identified key parts of the pathway that enables apicomplexan parasites to exit one host cell, and travel to infect others, including the important role of a molecule they called HOOK. This finding illuminates how signals can move in cells and could inform drug development against the parasites.
Since 2006, Seth Alexander has been president of the MIT Investment Management Company (MITIMCO), which manages the university's endowment, and oversees investment of its current funds, pension assets, and other institutional assets. Between 2006 and 2019, the MIT endowment grew from approximately...
Job Titles:
- Vice President for External Relations & Secretary
Sharon has worked in the advancement field for over 25 years and currently serves as Vice President for External Relations and Secretary of the Board of Directors for the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research. Before joining Whitehead Institute, she worked at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology...
Job Titles:
- Associate Director of Sponsored Programs
Sheri Grill is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Director Ruth Lehmann's lab studying germ cells, the cells that become eggs and sperm. We sat down with Sheri to learn more about her and her experiences in and out of the lab.
Job Titles:
- Associate Director of Intellectual Property
Job Titles:
- Professor of Genetics and Medicine at Harvard Medical School
Stephen J. Elledge is the Gregor Mendel Professor of Genetics and Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Brigham and Women's Hospital Division of Genetics, and is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. He received his B.S. in chemistry from the University of Illinois and his Ph.D. in...
Job Titles:
- Director of Research
- Finance
Sunny Das is a postdoc in Whitehead Institute Member Robert Weinberg's lab studying how breast cancer metastasizes or spreads to other tissues. We sat down with Sunny to learn more about him and his experiences in and out of the lab.
Whitehead represents the second generation of a renowned philanthropic family: Susan Whitehead's father, visionary industrialist and philanthropist Edwin C. "Jack" Whitehead, founded the Institute. She is a lifetime trustee of MIT and currently serves on the boards of the Museum of Science in...
Hockfield is president emerita and professor of neuroscience at MIT, where she served as the sixteenth president. As the first life scientist to lead MIT, she championed breakthroughs emerging from the convergence of the life, engineering, and physical sciences;...
Job Titles:
- Chairman of Women in Science
- Chairman of Women in Science Created
Susan Lindquist receives National Medal of Science
Member and former director Susan Lindquist received the National Medal of Science for her studies of protein folding, demonstrating that alternative protein conformations and aggregations can have profound and unexpected biological influences, facilitating insights in fields as wide-ranging as human disease, evolution, and biomaterials.
Johnson & Johnson honored the memory and achievements of former director Susan Lindquist (who tragically passed away in October 2016) by endowing the Susan Lindquist Chair for Women in Science at Whitehead Institute, to be awarded to a distinguished female scientist who is advancing biomedical research. The chair's first incumbent will be Yukiko Yamashita, a globally renowned researcher who joined the Institute in September 2020.
Job Titles:
- Venture Capital Leader and Founding Partner of Polaris Partners
Terry McGuire, a widely respected venture capital leader and founding partner of Polaris Partners, earned an MBA from Harvard Business School, an MS in engineering from the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College, and a BS in physics and economics from Hobart College. In the...
The Yamashita Lab studies the mechanisms that regulate asymmetric stem cell division, and their implications for cancer and other diseases.
Whitehead Institute Member Yukiko Yamashita and colleagues show that stem cells play a special role in maintaining ribosomal DNA, which they do by dividing asymmetrically.