News

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.

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.

Rare neurodegenerative diseases have been linked to excessive repeats in the DNA sequence. Whitehead Institute Member Ankur Jain and colleagues have uncovered a new mechanism that explains how an expanded CAG repeat — like the one involved in Huntington’s disease — can lead to the production of abnormal proteins, disrupting cell function.

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.

The Institute's newest Whitehead Fellows are Valhalla Fellow Allison Hamilos and Aditya Raguram. Watch these videos to meet them and learn more about their work.

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.

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.

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.

First-of-its-kind study uses MERFISH to map the spatial pattern of how stem cells choose their fates during adult regeneration in flatworms.