Matthew Vander Heiden, MD, PhD

Director, Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT

 

Professor of Biology, MIT 

 

Lester Wolfe (1919) Professor of Molecular Biology

 

Instructor in Medicine, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Bio     Research Interests     Key Publications

Bio

Research Interests

The long-term goal of the Vander Heiden Laboratory is to understand how mammalian cell metabolism is adapted to support cancer initiation and progression, with a major focus on pancreatic cancer.  Cancer cells have metabolic requirements that differ from most normal, non-proliferating cells. To proliferate, cancer cells must transform available nutrients into the varied array of macromolecules that are needed to build a new cell. Cancers also interact with host tissues, and the presence of cancer can alter whole-body physiology to cause changes that are affect survival and quality of life.  The Vander Heiden laboratory seeks to understand both how cancer cells use metabolism to support their growth in tumors, and how this impacts the other tissues to lead to phenotypes such as weight loss and tissue wasting. They use mouse and cell models of pancreatic cancer to dissect mechanisms underlying the metabolic changes observed in pancreatic cancer patients. 

Related to how metabolism support pancreatic cancer cell proliferation in tumors, work from the Vander Heiden laboratory and others has determined that environmental factors within tumors, including which nutrients are present, can constrain how those cells use metabolism to grow and divide. The Vander Heiden laboratory is working to define which nutrients are available in the pancreas, how those nutrients are affected by changes in diet and whole body metabolism and how the nutrients found in the liver and lung influence the ability of pancreatic cancer to metastasize. The Vander Heiden laboratory is also interested in how pancreatic cancer leads to weight loss and tissue wasting, particularly early in the disease. Their work has focused on how the cancer can affect the normal digestive function of the pancreas, and how this can lead to loss of both fat and muscle mass. They also are studying how diet and obesity affect pancreatic cancer initiation and progression, with a goal toward identifying interventions that might improve therapy for patients. Finally, in close collaboration with Brian Wolpin and other Hale Center Investigators, the Vander Heiden laboratory has found that tissue wasting can occur very early in pancreatic cancer disease progression, and a translational goal of the group is to explore how this might leveraged for earlier disease detection.

Key Publications