April 2022

Dr. Rosner is the Principal Investigator at the Rosner Laboratory and the Charles B. Huggins Professor of the Ben May Department of Cancer Research at the University of Chicago. After receiving her bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from Harvard University, and her Ph.D. degree in biochemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a student of Professor Har-Gobind Khorana, she then continued at MIT to pursue postdoctoral work as a fellow of the American Cancer Society in the laboratory of Dr. Phillip Robbins. Dr. Rosner joined the University of Chicago faculty as an Associate Professor in 1987 and was promoted to Full Professor in 1994, and currently teaches the Cancer Biology course. 

Dr. Rosner’s laboratory currently focuses on understanding fundamental signaling mechanisms leading to the generation of tumor cells and their progression to metastatic disease, particularly in triple-negative breast cancer that lacks targeted therapies. Systems level approaches are used including activity-based proteomics, RNAseq, ChIPseq, and mass spectrometry as well as computational, molecular, biophysical, cellular and mouse model-based methodologies to identify and characterize key regulators of tumor growth and metastasis. As an additional tool, the laboratory has utilized a specific physiological suppressor of metastasis, Raf Kinase Inhibitory Protein (RKIP or PEBP1), and a downstream target of RKIP in cells, BACH1, to identify both molecular and cellular mediators of metastasis. 

Recent studies from the Rosner Laboratory have shown that regulators of metastasis control multiple processes within the tumor cell microenvironment including metabolism, redox state, extracellular matrix, and recruitment and programming of tumor-associated macrophages.