Regeneration and Development

Cardiac and Cerebral Vasculature
Rebuilding the Heart and Brain

Open Positions

We welcome rotation students from the BCMB, PBSB, IMP, and Tri-I Programs. Prospective graduate students should apply through Weill Cornell Graduate School.

The lab is currently almost at capacity! However, if you are particularly enthusiastic about investigating cardiac or cerebral vasculature development and regeneration then enquire directly about upcoming Research Assistant, Postdoctoral Researcher, or undergraduate volunteer opportunities to mrh4003@med.cornell.edu

Those with experience in vasculature biology, zebrafish research, or the development and regeneration of the heart or brain are particularly encouraged to get in touch!

Postdoctoral Researcher Salary Range is: $58,500 - $66,538, Research Assistant Salary Range is $22.03/hr - $28.41/hr
Weill Cornell Medicine provides the above salary range in compliance with the New York City law on Salary Transparency in Job Advertisements. The salary range listed is for full time employment not including bonuses, clinical incentive compensation, or benefits. Actual salaries depend on a variety of factors including but not limited to internal equity, specialty, training, and hospital/community needs. The above salary range for New York City-based roles represents WCM’s good faith and reasonable estimate of possible compensation at the time of posting. Weill Cornell Medicine is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer. Weill Cornell Medicine provides equal employment opportunities to all qualified applicants without regard to race, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, color, age, religion, protected veteran or disability status, or genetic information.

Our Science

Zebrafish vasculature: A blueprint for understanding and treating human disease.
The human heart pumps 5 to 7 liters of blood around the body every minute, 20% of which serves the brain. Both require their own specialized blood and lymphatic vascular systems to meet their physiological demands. The overarching goal of our lab is to determine how this critical vasculature develops and how it regenerates after injury. We also study what functions blood and lymphatic vessels have beyond fluid transport. We are particularly interested in coronary vessels and cerebral vasculature's roles in promoting natural regenerative responses of heart and brain tissue. We primarily use the zebrafish as a discovery model, taking advantage of its ease of genetic manipulation and imaging. Advancing our understanding of the factors that drive vasculature formation and reformation, in addition to the roles of blood and lymphatic vasculature during tissue repair will highlight new concepts in regenerative medicine. Zebrafish have enhanced repair compared to mice and humans. The study of these natural processes in zebrafish can identify pathways that can be utilized to accelerate regeneration in mammals.

Blood and Lymphatic Vasculature

Understanding formation and function to develop new therapies

Coronary Vessel Development

Chemokine regulation of zebrafish coronary vasculature development

The zebrafish heart lacks coronary vessels until 1-month post-fertilization when a subset of endocardial cells sprout through the myocardium at the junction between the atrium and ventricle and form an immature coronary vessel in juvenile zebrafish. The ventricle, but not atrium, becomes vascularized by angiogenesis from this vessel. This is dependent on myocardial to endothelial cell-cell communication and we identified Cxcr4-Cxcl12 signaling as a key component of this process. Myocardial integration, coronary vascular endothelial cell specification and subtype differentiation are important processes involved in the establishment of an integrated functional coronary vascular tree. We aim to identify the developmental signals that drive these processes.

Lymphatic Vessels and Inflammation

Development of the lymphatic system and its role in heart and brain regeneration

We have demonstrated that in zebrafish the cardiac lymphatic system develops in two steps. Initially, prior to the development of coronary vessels, a lymphatic endothelial population is established on the outflow tract of the heart. Only once coronary vessel development is completed, does the lymphatic vasculature then branch down onto the ventricle along the newly established coronary arteries. In adult zebrafish, this system functions to reduce myocardial scarring during heart regeneration. The role of the lymphatic system in modulating a regenerative response has been largely under-appreciated; we are currently investigating its role post-injury and how its response is stimulated in both the heart and brain after injury.

Coronary Vessel Regeneration

Imagining Revascularization after injury

Following resection of the apex of the ventricle, the lost heart tissue regenerates, and new coronary vessels are formed. We designed and fabricated a fluidic device to culture explanted injured hearts on a live imaging microscope to continuously record the myocardial revascularization process over several days. The regenerated blood vasculature is derived from the uninjured vasculature that is proximal to the wound site. We are currently determining the process of this de novo coronary vessel formation after injury, including the cell lineages and pro-angiogenic cues that mediate it.