Del Vecchio Lab
Principal Investigator: Domitilla Del Vecchio
Institution: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, MA)
Primary Subfield: Synthetic Bio
Recruitment Status: Inquire for rotation/fellowship opportunities
Research Focus
Synthetic Genetic Controller Circuits for Transcription Factor-Directed Differentiation PI: Domitilla Del Vecchio1,2,3 co-I: James J. Collins2,3,4,5 co-I: Thorsten Schlaeger6 1Department of Mechanical Engineering, MIT; 2Department of Biological Engineering, MIT 3Synthetic Biology Center, MIT; 4Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard; 5The Wyss Institute 6 Stem Cell Transplantation Program, Boston Children’s Hospital PROJECT SUMMARY The ultimate goal of this project is to create synthetic genetic circuits that accurately control the level of cell fate- specific transcription factors (TFs) autonomously in response to cell state changes. The underlying hypothesis is that the level and timing of expression of critical TFs dictates the efficiency of cell conversion protocols and the quality of produced cells. Here, we focus on the differentiation of human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) into hemogenic endothelial cells (HECs) from which all hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSC/HPCs) arise. Current methods to derive definite HECs (dHECs), which have the potential to produce adult-type lymphoid cells and HSCs, remain largely inefficient and are also difficult to execute and scale…
Active NIH Awards
- 1R01EB038310-01: Synthetic Genetic Controller Circuits for Transcription Factor-Directed Differentiation (2026)
- 1R56EB036090-01: Synthetic Genetic Controller Circuits for Transcription Factor-Directed Differentiation (2024)
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