Latest News

• share
• favorite_border

Lehmann, a world renowned developmental and cell biology researcher, as the Institute’s fifth Director

• share
• favorite_border

A team of scientists has uncovered a surprising molecular link connecting how cells regulate growth with how they sense and make available nutrients. The findings also implicate a new protein as a potential drug target in pancreatic cancer.

• share
• favorite_border

For the first time, scientists have directly linked deletions in two genes in zebrafish and traits, such as seizures, hyperactivity, large head size, and increased fat content. Both genes are in a genome region linked to autism spectrum disorder, developmental delays, seizures, and obesity in humans

• share
• favorite_border

For more than a century, the link between thyroid hormone and red blood cell production has remained elusive. Now, Whitehead scientists have teased about the mechanism that connects them, which could help scientists identify new therapies for specific types of anemia.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute Member David Sabatini will be this year’s recipient of the Dickson Prize in Medicine. The annual award is the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine’s highest honor and recognizes “an American biomedical researcher who has made significant, progressive contributions to medicine”.

• share
• favorite_border

The transition from an egg to a developing embryo is one of life’s most remarkable transformations. Now Whitehead Institute researchers have used fruit flies to decipher how one aspect—control of the translation of messenger RNAs (mRNAs) into proteins—shifts as the egg becomes an the embryo. This type of switch could tell scientists more about how human cells work and embryos develop.

• share
• favorite_border

Many cultures traditionally use herbs believed to increase milk supply – so called galactagogues – although scientific data are lacking. Now Whitehead Institute Member Jing-Ke Weng and the Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation are teaming up to explore the effects of galactagogues on milk production.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute scientists have identified a gene that could help clinicians discern which patients have aggressive forms of early stage breast cancer, which could prevent hundreds of thousands of women from undergoing unnecessary treatment and save millions of dollars.

• share
• favorite_border

Using red blood cells modified to carry disease-specific antigens, scientists from Whitehead Institute and Boston Children’s Hospital have prevented and alleviated two autoimmune diseases—multiple sclerosis (MS) and type 1 diabetes—in early stage mouse models.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers at Whitehead Institute have now uncovered a role for the protein-folding chaperone HSP90 in humans, not only as a modifier of the effects of mutations, but as a mediator of the impact of the environment on the function of mutant proteins. And these effects of HSP90 can alter the course of human diseases.

• share
• favorite_border

Parkinson’s disease (PD) and other “synucleinopathies” are known to be linked to the misfolding of alpha-synuclein protein in neurons. Less clear is how this misfolding relates to the growing number of genes implicated in PD through analysis of human genetics. Researchers affiliated with Whitehead Institute and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) explain how they used a suite of novel biological and computational methods to shed light on the question.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute researchers provide insight into a specific gene pathway that appears to regulate the growth, structure, and organization of the human cortex. They also demonstrate that 3D human cerebral organoids can be effective in modeling the molecular, cellular, and anatomical processes of human brain development.

• share
• favorite_border

The use of proteasome inhibitors to treat cancer has been greatly limited by the ability of cancer cells to develop resistance to these drugs. But Whitehead Institute researchers have found a mechanism underlying this resistance—a mechanism that naturally occurs in many diverse cancer types and that may expose vulnerabilities to drugs that spur the natural cell-death process.

• share
• favorite_border

Targeting human genes required for HIV infection but not T cell survival may avoid inducing treatment resistance

• share
• favorite_border

The Susan Lindquist Chair for Women in Science will advance the work of women who are leaders in biomedical research and role models for emerging female scientists. It honors a singular scientist who blazed a path—for women and men alike—into new realms of discovery.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute researchers have determined how the master transcriptional regulator of the heat shock response, known as heat shock factor 1 (HSF1), is controlled in yeast. Understanding how HSF1 works, how it is regulated, and how to fine tune it in a cell-type specific way could lead to therapies for cancer and neurodegenerative diseases.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers using a mouse model of Rett Syndrome find that cortical pyramidal neurons have faults in excitatory and inhibitory signaling; and demonstrate why recombinant human Insulin Like Growth Factor 1 has had therapeutic effects for RTT patients in clinical trials.

• share
• favorite_border

“Sue has meant so much to Whitehead as an institution of science, and as a community of scientists, and her passing leaves us diminished in so many ways,” reflects David C. Page, M.D., Director of Whitehead Institute

• share
• favorite_border

Using an unbiased screen in yeast, a team of Whitehead Institute and Stanford University scientists have identified dozens of prion-like proteins that could change the defining characteristics of these unusual proteins.

• share
• favorite_border

Inherited methylation—a form of epigenetic regulation passed down from parents to offspring—is far more dynamic than previously thought and may contribute to changes in the brain and other tissues over time. This finding by Whitehead Institute scientists challenges current understandings of gene regulation via methylation, from development through adulthood.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute researchers have conducted the first genome-wide screen in Apicomplexa, a phylum of single-celled parasites that cause diseases such as malaria and toxoplasmosis. The screen sheds light into the vast, unstudied reaches of parasite genomes, uncovering for instance a protein common to all apicomplexans.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute scientists have developed a method to quickly isolate mitochondria from mammalian cells and systematically measure the concentrations of mitochondrial metabolites. Mitochondrial dysfunction is found in several disorders, including Parkinson’s disease, cardiovascular disease, and mitochondrial diseases. Until now, peering into the inner metabolic workings of these vital organelles has been very challenging.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute scientists have identified a potential antifungal mechanism that could enable combination therapy with fluconazole, one of today’s most commonly prescribed fungal infection treatments. Severe, invasive fungal infections have a mortality rate of 30-50% and cause an estimated 1.5 million deaths worldwide annually.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute scientists have created a checklist that defines the “naive” state of cultured human embryonic stem cells (ESCs). Such cells provide a better model of early human embryogenesis than conventional ESCs in later stages of development.

• share
• favorite_border

Using tiny, alpaca-derived, single-domain antibody fragments, Whitehead Institute scientists have developed a method to perturb cellular processes in mammalian cells, allowing them to tease apart the roles that individual proteins play in these pathways. With improved knowledge of protein activity, scientists can better understand not only basic biology but also how disease corrupts cellular function and identify potential therapeutics to rectify these aberrations.

• share
• favorite_border

Using a novel method, Whitehead Institute researchers have determined how mutations that are not located within genes are identified through genome-wide association studies (GWAS) and can contribute to sporadic Parkinson’s disease, the most common form of the condition. The approach could be used to analyze GWAS results for other sporadic diseases with genetic causes, such as multiple sclerosis, diabetes, and cancer.

• share
• favorite_border

In a finding with enormous implications for cancer diagnostics and therapeutics, Whitehead Institute scientists have discovered that breaches in looping chromosomal structures known as “insulated neighborhoods” can activate oncogenes capable of fueling aggressive tumor growth.

• share
• favorite_border

Over the past decade, studies have found that obesity and eating a high-fat, high-calorie diet are significant risk factors for many types of cancer. Now, a new study from Whitehead Institute and MIT’s Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research reveals how a high-fat diet makes the cells of the intestinal lining more likely to become cancerous.

• share
• favorite_border

Whitehead Institute researchers have created a hydrogel scaffold that replicates the environment found within the human breast. The scaffold supports the growth of human mammary tissue from patient-derived cells and can be used to study normal breast development as well as breast cancer initiation and progression.

• share
• favorite_border

The germinal centers that form in the body’s lymph nodes work as a fitness boot camp in which B cells evolve to produce antibodies of increasingly higher affinity to an invading pathogen. This new finding from Whitehead Institute scientists overturns a previously held notion that only a narrow range of B cells can survive this training and go on to secrete high-affinity antibodies. This revised understanding may aid development of effective vaccines against HIV, influenza, and other viruses that mutate rapidly.