News

Whitehead researchers discover that, unlike other cancers, melanoma is born with its metastatic engines fully revved.

The human and the chimpanzee Y chromosomes went their separate ways approximately 6 million years ago. But ever since this evolutionary parting, these two chromosomes have experienced different fates, ne research indicates.

Chemotherapy or organ transplantation not only take a huge toll on patients, but they can compromise the immune system and leave patients vulnerable to infections from microbes such as pathogenic fungi—the fastest-growing cause of hospital-acquired infections.

Chop a planarian flatworm in half and you end up with two healthy, wiggly worms. Unfortunately, not so with a lab mouse or fruit fly. Peter Reddien, who joins the Whitehead faculty as Associate Member this August after completing a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Utah, is determined to find out why.

Whitehead Associate Member David Sabatini has been chosen by the W.M. Keck Foundation as one of this year’s grant recipients under the Distinguished Young Scholars in Medical Research program.

Splitting their time between lab and clinic, Whitehead physician-scientists bring research and reassurance to patients.

Deep in your DNA, a gene has gone haywire and is driving up the production of a protein that is messing with your body. Wouldn’t it be great to sift through all your 20,000-something genes, find the offender, and swat it like a fly? Fortunately, a new technique eventually could do just that.

Better understanding of fat-cell hormones will help us attack the twin epidemics of obesity and diabetes. Harvey Lodish, a Founding Whitehead Member and professor of biology at MIT, has pioneered this field.

Whitehead Institute Member David Bartel is one of two scientists to receive the annual Louis-D. Prize from the Institut de France, an organization similar in many respects to the National Academy of Sciences in the United States.

The United States should follow the lead of Massachusetts in legalizing responsible human embryonic stem cell research, Senator Edward Kennedy declared on June 2 at Whitehead.