Wendel Lab
Principal Investigator: Hans-Guido Wendel
Institution: Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (New York, NY)
Primary Subfield: Molecular & Cell Bio
Recruitment Status: ✅ Accepting PhD Students ✅ Hiring Postdocs
Research Focus
Towards Targeting the Follicular Lymphoma Microenvironment Follicular lymphoma (FL) is the second most common and still incurable form of B cell lymphoma. FL is a slow growing cancer that shows a unique dependence on a supportive microenvironment. The supportive niche also affects FL therapies. For example, inhibitors of BTK, PI3K, or BCL2 show exciting activity against aggressive lymphomas and chronic leukemia, but they have little activity against indolent FLs. We speculate that the FL microenvironment protects and sustains the malignant B cells and contributes to FL development, progression, and resistance to therapy. Conversely, we propose that disrupting interactions in the FL niche will be especially effective against FL. Our hypothesis is based on prior work by others and our own work on immune receptor mutations in FL (e.g. TNFSRF14 and EphA7) have revealed cell-cell interactions as key drivers and sustainers of FL biology. My lab has made major contributions to our understanding of the biology and genetics of FL. We built an accurate mouse model of FL and we and others have used this model to interpret the biological function of the most common FL drivers. For example, we…
Active NIH Awards
- 5R35CA252982-07: Towards targeting the lymphoma microenvironment (2026)
- 5R35CA252982-06: Towards targeting the lymphoma microenvironment (2025)
- 5R35CA252982-05: Towards targeting the lymphoma microenvironment (2024)
Explore 700+ US Biology Labs on FindBioLabs.com