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Headshot of Richard Hynes, sitting in front of a bookcase

Remembering Richard Hynes

MIT Koch Institute

January 23, 2026

With great sadness, the Koch Institute marks the passing of Richard O. Hynes PhD ’71, whose discoveries reshaped modern understandings of how cells interact with each other and their environment, who died January 6, 2026 at age 81.

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Upgraded Model

Nature Biotechnology

December 18, 2026

To help mouse models of disease better resemble human genetics, the Sánchez-Rivera group has developed H2M, a computational pipeline to predict mouse genetic variants that mirror the sequence and functional effects of human variants. H2M also performs mouse-to-human and other types of variant mapping for precision genome-editing tools. Published in Nature Biotechnology, the researchers share their database, libraries, and web tool online.

Irvine Lands on TIME100 Health 2026 List

Time Magazine

February 12, 2026

Long-time faculty member Darrell Irvine has been named to the 2026 TIME100 Health, an annual list of the 100 individuals who most influenced global health this year. Irvine is recognized for his work empowering the immune system to fight cancer, HIV, and other diseases, including therapeutic cancer vaccine approaches developed in his KI lab that have shown stunning promise in trials headed by KI startup Elicio Therapeutics. 

Vander Heiden and Shaw Elected as AACR Fellows

American Association for Cancer Research

February 4, 2026

KI Director Matthew Vander Heiden has been elected to the 2026 class of Fellows of the AACR Academy. Membership honors scientists whose work has had a lasting global impact on cancer research, including Vander Heiden’s work in cancer metabolism.  Alice Shaw, MD, PhD, was also elected, for her work in targeted therapies and precision oncology. A Jacks Lab alumna, she also served as the Koch Institute's inaugural Charles W. (1955) and Jennifer C. Johnson Clinical Investigator.  

Ultrasound Goes Ultra Accessible 

MIT News

February 2, 2026

A portable, smartphone-sized 3D ultrasound sensor developed in the lab of KI alum Canan Dagdeviren could improve early breast cancer detection for high‑risk individuals. Clinical trials are evaluating its ability to detect tumors earlier than yearly mammograms in high-risk patients, and MIT entrepreneurship programs are helping a startup advance commercialization of this low-cost, miniaturized technology.

Metabolic mixes modulate metastatic sites

Mass General Brigham

January 26, 2026

A Nature study from Matt Vander Heiden’s laboratory, in collaboration with MGB’s Rakesh Jain and Harvard’s George Church helps illuminate the factors determining where cancers can metastasize. In mice, the researchers quantified levels of metabolites in multiple tissues, investigating their relation to breast cancer cells’ ability to grow in different organs. They found a complex interplay of multiple nutrients in the local environment defines the sites of breast cancer metastases.This work was supported in part by The Bridge Project.

Remembering Richard Hynes

MIT Koch Institute

January 23, 2026

With great sadness, the Koch Institute marks the passing of Richard O. Hynes PhD ’71, whose discoveries reshaped modern understandings of how cells interact with each other and their environment, who died January 6, 2026 at age 81.

From Nematode to Nobel

McGovern Institute

January 12, 2026

Why study worms? H. Robert Horvitz, David H. Koch (1962) Professor of Biology, with several notable former trainees and fellow Nobel laureates, makes the case in a recent PNAS paper. They highlight critical discoveries—spanning normal biology, gene regulation, and diseases including cancer—as well as research tools for imaging that have emerged from studies of a microscopic roundworm, and emphasize the community spirit and resource sharing that enabled and continue to enable this work.

Forest White Honored with Committed to Caring Award

MIT News

January 8, 2026

Congratulations to Forest White on receiving MIT’s Committed to Caring Award! This graduate student‑nominated honor recognizes faculty members whose mentorship fosters resilience, curiosity, and compassion, having a lasting impact on students’ academic and personal journeys. Forest joins 18 honorees exemplifying exceptional care and guidance in the MIT community.

Sean Luk: Addressing the urgent need for better immunotherapy  

MIT News

January 6, 2026

Motivated by her family’s cancer experiences, MIT senior Sean Luk engineers proteins in the Wittrup Lab to boost the immune system’s attack against tumors and improve cancer immunotherapies. “The complexity of the immune system really fascinated me, and it is incredible that we can build antibodies in a very logical way to address disease,” Luk says.

Predicting Peptides with CleaveNet

MIT News

January 6, 2026

Bhatia Lab researchers have developed CleaveNet, a novel AI system described in Nature Communications, to design peptides that could be cleaved efficiently and specifically by proteases of interest, such as enzymes overactive in cancer.