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Grace’s Story: In-Home Cancer Care Lets Kids Be Kids
March 26, 2024
Tufts Medicine’s Care at Home delivers top-quality cancer care to kids at home.
Treatment Combination of Durvalumab, Tremelimumab and Enfortumab Vedotin or Durvalumab and Enfortumab Vedotin in Patients With Muscle Invasive Bladder Cancer Ineligible to Cisplatin or Who Refuse Cisplatin (VOLGA)
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Department of Medicine, Cancer Center
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Wound Healing and Recovery after Surgery Using AI
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Department of Surgery
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MCRI Cardio-Oncology Research Group

The Cardio-Oncology Research Group brings together basic scientists from the Molecular Cardiology Research Institute (MCRI) with clinician-investigators from the Cardiology and Oncology Divisions at Tufts Medical Center and at the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University along with scientists at Tufts University Schools of Medicine and Engineering and statisticians and population researchers in the Institute for Clinical Research and Health Policy Studies (ICRHPS) and the Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (CTSI). Together, the goal of the Cardio-Oncology Research Group is to advance our understanding of genetic, biological and clinical factors that contribute to the cardiovascular side effects of cancer therapies, to identify biomarkers of toxicity that can be employed to improve clinical care and to determine therapies to mitigate the side effects of cancer treatment. The group uses a one-health approach to develop a cross-species platform that includes cellular and model organisms, canine cancer patients and human cancer patients to investigate novel mechanisms, biomarkers and therapies to improve cardiovascular outcomes in cancer patients.
With the explosion in novel cancer therapies, cancer outcomes have improved dramatically resulting in a growing population of cancer survivors. Simultaneously, there has been a rise in cardiovascular side effects of these cancer therapies that is limiting quality of life and life expectancy of cancer survivors.
Patient Stories
Longtime Nurse Treated for Rectal Cancer at Tufts Medical Center
March 18, 2024
Mary Roach, RN has been a nurse at Tufts Medical Center for more than three decades. When she was diagnosed with rectal cancer, she knew where she wanted to receive care.

MCRI Women’s Cardiovascular Health Research Group

The goal is to advance our global understanding of genetic, biological, lifestyle, and psychosocial factors that contribute to heart and blood vessel health in women, and to determine how these mechanisms differ from men and change when women develop cardiovascular disease, the leading cause of death in women. The group is focused on understanding how women’s cardiovascular health changes over the lifespan and the disproportionate impact of risk factors (ie obesity, preeclampsia, diabetes) on women’s health.
The Women’s CV Health Research Group brings together basic scientists from the Molecular Cardiology Research Institute (MCRI) with scientists, clinician investigators and population researchers from diverse Departments at Tufts Medical Center including Internal Medicine, the Woman, Mother and Baby Research Institute, Obstetrics and Gynecology, and Pediatrics with the Tufts Freidman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Tufts University School of Medicine and School of Public Health, and the Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging (HNRCA) with common interests in studying the unique aspects of Women’s Cardiovascular Health.

Pulakat Laboratory

They are developing new treatments to mitigate cardiovascular pathologies induced by obesity and diabetes and unique trans-tissue drug delivery systems for localized treatments to prevent diabetic foot ulcers. Their efforts are also directed at developing a lung treatment to mitigate chronic infection and inflammation in the lower airways of the lungs via localized deep-tissue drug delivery. Past research from the Pulakat Lab identified cardiac-specific cytokine and microRNA markers associated with the progression of diabetes and in response to treatment with Rapamycin, an anti-aging drug. They also elucidated the structure-function relationship of cardiovascular reparative Angiotensin II (Ang II) receptor AT2R and novel signaling networks of the AT2R that can mitigate the progression of heart disease and vascular damage caused by diabetes and obesity.


Current projects include:
The core focus of the Pulakat lab is the elucidation and manipulation of various biological pathways that contribute to the development and pathogenesis of cardio-metabolic diseases and aging and uncovering markers of sex differences in heart disease.
Our publications

Jaffe Laboratory

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A major area of interest is the role of the hormone aldosterone and the receptor by which it functions, the mineralocorticoid receptor (MR), in the molecular mechanisms of cardiovascular disease. The steroid hormone aldosterone is the final step in the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone pathway that regulates blood pressure and electrolyte homeostasis by activating MR in the kidney to regulate genes involved in renal sodium handling. We and others have demonstrated that MR is expressed in cells of the human blood vessel, supporting the possibility that direct effects of aldosterone on the vasculature could play a role in vascular function and disease. This is clinically significant because, in human clinical trials, pharmacologic inhibition of the MR prevents heart attacks, strokes and cardiovascular deaths with minimal effects on systemic blood pressure.

A second major area fits in the field of cardio-oncology. The Jaffe lab is exploring the impact of cancer treatment on blood vessels and how this might contribute to side effects in cancer survivors. We are exploring the molecular mechanisms for these clinical findings in order to gain a better understanding of the mechanisms of cardiovascular disease and to identify novel therapeutic drug targets for common vascular diseases or to protect cancer patients from adverse side effects.

The Jaffe laboratory routinely uses in vitro molecular and cellular biology methods, primary human vascular cell culture models, state-of-the-art transgenic mouse models with in vivo capabilities to study rodent models of cardiovascular physiology and disease, unbiased transcriptomics, proteomics, and epi-genomics methods, and translational studies utilizing human samples from our patients across Tufts Medicine.

Current projects include:
The Jaffe laboratory is focused on understanding the molecular mechanisms by which blood vessels become dysfunctional to lead to common cardiovascular conditions, including heart attack, stroke, high blood pressure, in-stent restenosis, vein graft failure and heart failure. We are interested in understanding how traditional risk factors like aging, obesity, high blood pressure or high cholesterol, or new risk factors like novel cancer treatments, cause blood vessels to become diseased. We are also focused on understanding sex differences in how these cardiovascular diseases develop, in order to identify sex-specific precision medicine strategies.
Our publications

Icli Laboratory

Icli Lab focuses on the role of microRNAs, a class of non-coding RNAs, in ischemic vascular disease states such as myocardial infarction, diabetic wound healing and obesity-induced chronic inflammation. Our group studies these complex disease states using diverse model systems including human plasma and tissue samples, human organoids, transgenic mouse models as well as primary cells. We take a multifaceted approach to delineate the disease mechanisms by utilizing state-of-the-art molecular biology techniques, bioinformatic approaches, bulk and single-cell RNA-seq, immunohistochemistry, and live animal imaging.
Our publications

Huggins Laboratory

Current projects include:
The overarching goal of the lab is to identify genes associated with human heart disease. We believe firmly in the benefit of making primary discoveries advancing understanding of human disease whenever possible, in humans. Within the past two decades, the human genome sequence has been completed and a map of genetic markers suitable for studying disease associations has been established. Both candidate gene and genome-wide association studies are performed in the Huggins laboratory with a focus on valve disease and genetic cardiomyopathy.
Our publications