PitarresiPhD

Jason R. Pitarresi. Father. Studying pancreatic cancer, cellular plasticity/metastasis, and tumor-host interactions. @pitarresilab.bsky.social

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

I'm excited to share the lab’s new paper on PDAC-associated cachexia on bioRxiv today, led by star postdoc @Nikita2106

Pancreatic cancer cachexia is mediated by PTHrP-driven disruption of adipose de novo lipogenesis

A 🧵 below, if you're interested...

https://t.co/SKsxKkdvog

[Meaghan McGeary, PhD @Mk_Mcg5]

I’m honored to receive this years HBF award with several other amazing pancreas cancer researchers! 💜🎗️

[Hopper-Belmont Foundation @Hopper_Belmont]

🎉 Congratulations to HBF’s 2026 Pancreatic Cancer Inspiration Award winners!

🔬 Divya Ravi, PhD – OHSU
🔬 Ariana Musa de Aquino, PhD – Henry Ford Health
🔬 Meaghan McGeary, PhD – MIT

https://t.co/dvA0eJ5ch5

[Tony Hui @realTonyHui]

Happy to report a rigorously controlled, comprehensively characterized mouse model in which cachexia is driven specifically by lung metastases, paired with a genetically identical, non-cachectic control group. Hope cachexia researchers find it useful. https://t.co/v8f9IWZDkg

[NSERC / CRSNG @NSERC_CRSNG]

🏆
Lawrence Kazak (@kazaklab), of @mcgillu, is awarded an Arthur B. McDonald Fellowship in recognition of his findings that reshaped the fundamental understanding of how the body expends energy.

▶️ https://t.co/k8zoB0ZiJH

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

Congrats Nada and the rest of the team!

[Nada Kalaany @nada_kalaany]

Ever wondered what happens #Metabolically throughout the body when the presence of #Cancer results in life-threatening debilitating loss of #Muscle and #Fat in patients, decreasing their quality of life, and preventing them from receiving therapy they need to extend #Survival?

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

Another successful @UMassChan Cancer Center Retreat in the books!

Congrats to Paula Vo for winning a best poster award and Calvin Johnson for being selected for a talk!

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

An absolutely beautiful study in Nature Cancer by the Chio lab on a novel mechanism of adipose tissue wasting in pancreatic cancer.

Congrats to Christine, first author Jung Seung Nam, and the rest of the @Chiolaboratory!

[Christine Chio @Chiolaboratory]

Very happy to share our new paper in Nature Cancer. This project started with a simple question: what drives the early loss of adipose tissue during pancreatic cancer cachexia?

[Marcus Ruscetti Lab @Marcus_Ruscetti]

Happy to see our recent paper from @linzhou0515 online at @CR_AACR. Here we tested a panel of senescence-inducing therapies with different MoAs to uncover their unique SASP profiles and impact on immunity, and from that design effective senolytic approaches to block metastasis.

[Marcus Goncalves @MarcusDGon]

Quantitative in vivo flux analysis reveals tumor and host lipogenic remodeling in KRAS-driven lung cancer
https://t.co/y1bFiSXpcO

[Yumi Kim (김유미) @Yumi_Kim0201]

Excited to see our work published in @ScienceAdvances! 🎉

Very grateful to Gina DeNicola (@LabDeNicola) and all our coauthors who made this work possible.

🔗 https://t.co/3zv9CX14G9

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

Fantastic work Marcus and team!

[Marcus Goncalves @MarcusDGon]

New paper out in @cellpressblue ! We found that reintroducing refined starch after weight loss activates the innate immune system through the complement pathway, while sugar has the opposite effect. With @eze_dantas , @davidludwigmd , CaraEbbeling, @CantleyLab , and team. 🧵

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

I am very grateful to @NIH staff for their support and efforts in helping us secure this R56 award from the NCI

I'm especially appreciative of my PO for championing our work on a novel driver of pancreatic cancer metastasis that has revealed exciting therapeutic vulnerabilities!

[Anirban Maitra @Aiims1742]

Important changes coming to how @NIH reports scores on reviewed grants - while individual reviewers will still provide an overall impact score, the investigators will only receive information on which of three broader categories their grant falls under:
https://t.co/OSHzIMR5cn

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

Congrats to Nikita Bhalerao in the lab on being promoted to Instructor @UMassChan last month!

She is entering the academic job market this year and will come with her own funding (Early K99/R00). Search committees, be on the lookout for this stellar candidate.

Congrats Nikita!

[Marcus Ruscetti Lab @Marcus_Ruscetti]

Congrats to @ChaitanyaParik on his innovative and impactful work in the lab! Be on a look out for this rising star and his company, ImmunoScript, in the biotech space! Hope to see this therapy in patients one day.

[Mara Sherman Lab @MaraShermanLab]

Neural niches are recurrent features of human cancer that may relay signals to nearby cells, to the immune system, + to the brain. So what’s in these niches, and what happens when cancer cells barge in? We take a look under the hood in our new preprint 1/ https://t.co/88HcRTswJJ

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

@KarunaMDPhD @Nature As always, a beautiful story Karuna. Congrats to you and the team!!

[PitarresiPhD @PitarresiLab]

It was a pleasure to host Tanushree in the lab as part of the Summer Undergrad Research Program (SURP) at UMass Chan. She worked with Nikita in the lab on sexual dimorphism in cachexia. Can't wait to see what you accomplish next!

[Katherine Aird @airdlab]

Thrilled to see our work on senescence & metastasis out! We found that chemotherapy increases ovarian cancer metastasis in a paracrine manner via fructose. Dietary fructose is sufficient to increase metastatis. This work has multiple implications related to both chemo and diet.

[Marcus Ruscetti Lab @Marcus_Ruscetti]

Our paper is out today in @NatureComms. @ChaitanyaParik developed an all-in-one cytokine and antigen mRNA therapy that can produce pancreatic cancer cures in 50% of mice! Excited to take this technology into patients with our company ImmunoScript.
https://t.co/6GaACGBGbj