Molecular Biology Program
The Agnel Sfeir Lab
Research
Chromosomes are the fundamental structural units of our genome. The Sfeir lab seeks to understand basic chromosome biology and how their mismanagement manifests in disease. Our research is focused on three major areas: telomere maintenance, nuclear DNA repair, and mitochondrial DNA replication and repair. A number of projects in the lab address fundamental questions related to telomere maintenance and how telomere dysfunction impacts cancer. In addition, we study an ancient yet error-prone DNA repair pathway, termed micro-homology mediated end-joining, and focus on polymerase theta, a key enzyme underlying mutagenic repair. Lastly, we investigate replication and repair of mitochondrial genomes and explore mitochondrial-nuclear crosstalk in response to mitochondrial DNA stress.
Research Projects
Featured News
Publications Highlights
Brambati A#, Sacco O#, Porcells A#, Heyza J, Kareh M, Schmidt JC, Sfeir A. RHINO directs MMEJ to repair DNA breaks in mitosis Science. 2023 Jul 13:eadh3694. doi: 10.1126/science.adh3694. PMID: 37440612
Tigano M, Tremblay-Belzile S, Vargas DC, Fu Y, Sfeir A* Nuclear sensing of mitochondrial DNA breaks enhances immune surveillance Nature. 2021 Feb 4: doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03269-w
Mateos-Gomez PA, Gong F, Nair N, Miller KM, Lazzerini-Denchi E, Sfeir A*. (2015) Mammalian Polymerase Theta Promotes Alternative-NHEJ and Suppresses Recombination. Nature. Feb 12;518(7538):254-7. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature14157
People
Agnel Sfeir, PhD
PaineWebber Chair in Cancer Genetics
- The Sfeir Lab investigates pathways that ensure genome fidelity and plasticity.
- PhD, UT Southwestern Medical Center, Texas (2006)
- Post-Doc, The Rockefeller University, New York (2011)
Members
- MD, Columbia University (2019)
- PhD, Columbia University (2018)
- PhD, University of Pavia (2015)
- B.S., Andrews University (2023)
- PhD, Duke University School of Medicine (2018)
- MD, Duke University School of Medicine (2019)
- Ph.D. - Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN (2022)
- Ph.D. - The Rockefeller University, New York, NY (2023)
- Post-Doc, The Rockefeller University (1995)
- PhD, Albert Einstein College of Medicine (1987)
- B.S. University of Texas - Austin, Texas - 2020
- B.S., University of California, Davis (2020)
- BSc, Tufts university, MA (2016)
- MSc, Hunter college, NY (2018)
- PhD, Columbia University Medical Center, NY (2018)
- PhD, University of Montreal, Quebec, Canada (2018)
- New York University, NY (Current)
Lab Alumni
Lab Affiliations
Achievements
- Damon Runyon-Rachleff Innovator Award
- Human Frontier Science Program Young Investigator Award
- V-Foundation Scholar
- Pew-Stewart Scholar for Cancer Research
- NIH Director’s New Innovator Award
Read more
- The David and Lucile Packard Foundation Award
- Pershing Square Sohn Prize for Young Investigators
- Mallinckrodt Scholar Award
Open Positions
To learn more about available postdoctoral opportunities, please visit our Career Center
To learn more about compensation and benefits for postdoctoral researchers at MSK, please visit Resources for Postdocs
Disclosures
Doctors and faculty members often work with pharmaceutical, device, biotechnology, and life sciences companies, and other organizations outside of MSK, to find safe and effective cancer treatments, to improve patient care, and to educate the health care community.
MSK requires doctors and faculty members to report (“disclose”) the relationships and financial interests they have with external entities. As a commitment to transparency with our community, we make that information available to the public.
Agnel Sfeir discloses the following relationships and financial interests:
-
Repare Therapeutics
Equity; Intellectual Property Rights; Professional Services and Activities
The information published here is a complement to other publicly reported data and is for a specific annual disclosure period. There may be differences between information on this and other public sites as a result of different reporting periods and/or the various ways relationships and financial interests are categorized by organizations that publish such data.
This page and data include information for a specific MSK annual disclosure period (January 1, 2023 through disclosure submission in spring 2024). This data reflects interests that may or may not still exist. This data is updated annually.
Learn more about MSK’s COI policies here. For questions regarding MSK’s COI-related policies and procedures, email MSK’s Compliance Office at [email protected].