Research we fund

Hairy cell leukemia (HCL) is very sensitive to chemotherapy, whose toxicity to the bone marrow and the immune system is however concerning. We have established vemurafenib plus rituximab as a very effective chemotherapy-free regimen in relapsed/refractory HCL (NEJM, in press). Here, we will test it in a clinical trial against a chemotherapy-based standard of care represented by cladribine plus rituximab, aiming at lower toxicity and similar efficacy.

My research focuses on why and how risk of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) increases with aging. Studying naturally aged mouse models in combination with mice engineered to express mutations commonly found in human blood stem cells with aging, we are investigating whether certain inflammatory factors that increase during aging increase the risk of leukemia. My goal is to identify biomarkers to assess risk of AML development in aging individuals and define new therapeutic targets to prevent AML.

In this proposal, we have combined clinical and research expertise in HCL across Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Weill Cornell Medical College, the University of Pennsylvania, and Yale University to develop newer targeted therapeutics for every stage and subtype of hairy cell leukemia. Capitalizing on this combined expertise, our proposal stands to significantly advance treatment strategies for hairy cell leukemia through the following aims: to test BRAF inhibition for initial treatment of classical hairy cell leukemia, test new oral inhibitors of the MAP kinase signaling pathway known as ERK inhibitors in both classical and variant hairy cell leukemia, evaluate totally new treatments that degrade BRAF, and develop T-cell immunotherapies for the first time in hairy cell leukemia.