Heather L. Machado, PhD
Assistant Dean for the Biomedical Sciences Graduate Program
Biography
Click to Visit Dr. Machado's Lab Website
Heather Machado, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Tulane School of Medicine, and a program member of the Tulane Cancer Center and the Louisiana Cancer Research Consortium.
Dr. Machado completed her Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology from Tulane School of Medicine in 2005, under the supervision of Cindy A. Morris, Ph.D. She went on to conduct her postdoctoral studies in the laboratory of Dr. Jeffrey M. Rosen at Baylor College of Medicine, where she focused on understanding the role of normal stem cells in mammary gland development and in human breast cancer. She opened her laboratory in 2013 upon joining the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Tulane School of Medicine. She is an active member of the American Association of Cancer Research and the Tumor Microenvironment Women in Cancer Research working groups.
Research
Contributions
Rojo MD, Bandyopadhyay I, Burke CM, Sturtz AD, Phillips ES, Matherne MG, Embrey SJ, LaRue R, Qiu Y, Schwertfeger KL, Machado HL. C/EBPβ deletion in macrophages impairs mammary gland alveolar budding during the estrous cycle. Life Sci Alliance. 2024 Jul 18;7(10):e202302516. doi: 10.26508/lsa.202302516. PMID: 39025525; PMCID: PMC11258408.
Matherne MG, Phillips ES, Embrey SJ, Burke CM, Machado HL. Emerging functions of C/EBPβ in breast cancer. Front Oncol. 2023;13:1111522. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2023.1111522. eCollection 2023. Review. PubMed PMID: 36761942; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC9905667.
Shahbandi A, Chiu FY, Ungerleider NA, Kvadas R, Mheidly Z, Sun MJS, Tian D, Waizman DA, Anderson AY, Machado HL, Pursell ZF, Rao SG, Jackson JG. Breast cancer cells survive chemotherapy by activating targetable immune-modulatory programs characterized by PD-L1 or CD80. Nat Cancer. 2022 Dec;3(12):1513-1533. doi: 10.1038/s43018-022-00466-y. Epub 2022 Dec 8. PubMed PMID: 36482233; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC9923777.
Iftikhar R, Penrose HM, King AN, Kim Y, Ruiz E, Kandil E, Machado HL, Savkovic SD. FOXO3 Expression in Macrophages Is Lowered by a High-Fat Diet and Regulates Colonic Inflammation and Tumorigenesis. Metabolites. 2022 Mar 16;12(3). doi: 10.3390/metabo12030250. PubMed PMID: 35323693; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC8949544.
Newton EE, Mueller LE, Treadwell SM, Morris CA, Machado HL. Molecular Targets of Triple-Negative Breast Cancer: Where Do We Stand?. Cancers (Basel). 2022 Jan 18;14(3). doi: 10.3390/cancers14030482. Review. PubMed PMID: 35158750; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC8833442.
Ibrahim AM, Moss MA, Gray Z, Rojo MD, Burke CM, Schwertfeger KL, Dos Santos CO, Machado HL. Diverse Macrophage Populations Contribute to the Inflammatory Microenvironment in Premalignant Lesions During Localized Invasion. Front Oncol. 2020;10:569985. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2020.569985. eCollection 2020. PubMed PMID: 33072601; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC7541939.
Wang Y, Chaffee TS, LaRue RS, Huggins DN, Witschen PM, Ibrahim AM, Nelson AC, Machado HL, Schwertfeger KL. Tissue-resident macrophages promote extracellular matrix homeostasis in the mammary gland stroma of nulliparous mice. Elife. 2020 Jun 1;9. doi: 10.7554/eLife.57438. PubMed PMID: 32479261; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC7297528.
Ibrahim AM, Gray Z, Gomes AM, Myers L, Behbod F, Machado HL. Gas6 expression is reduced in advanced breast cancers. NPJ Precis Oncol. 2020;4:9. doi: 10.1038/s41698-020-0116-z. eCollection 2020. PubMed PMID: 32352034; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC7181799.
Gomes AM, Carron EC, Mills KL, Dow AM, Gray Z, Fecca CR, Lakey MA, Carmeliet P, Kittrell F, Medina D, Machado HL. Stromal Gas6 promotes the progression of premalignant mammary cells. Oncogene. 2019 Apr;38(14):2437-2450. doi: 10.1038/s41388-018-0593-5. Epub 2018 Dec 7. PubMed PMID: 30531835; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC6450766.
Mills KL, Gomes AM, Standlee CR, Rojo MD, Carmeliet P, Lin Z, Machado HL. Gas6 is dispensable for pubertal mammary gland development. PLoS One. 2018;13(12):e0208550. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0208550. eCollection 2018. PubMed PMID: 30533018; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC6289431.
Nelson AC, Machado HL, Schwertfeger KL. Breaking through to the Other Side: Microenvironment Contributions to DCIS Initiation and Progression. J Mammary Gland Biol Neoplasia. 2018 Dec;23(4):207-221. doi: 10.1007/s10911-018-9409-z. Epub 2018 Aug 31. Review. PubMed PMID: 30168075; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC6237657.
Behbod F, Gomes AM, Machado HL. Modeling Human Ductal Carcinoma In Situ in the Mouse. J Mammary Gland Biol Neoplasia. 2018 Dec;23(4):269-278. doi: 10.1007/s10911-018-9408-0. Epub 2018 Aug 25. Review. PubMed PMID: 30145750; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC6244883.
D'Errico G, Machado HL, Sainz B Jr. A current perspective on cancer immune therapy: step-by-step approach to constructing the magic bullet. Clin Transl Med. 2017 Dec;6(1):3. doi: 10.1186/s40169-016-0130-5. Epub 2017 Jan 3. Review. PubMed PMID: 28050779; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC5209322.
Carron EC, Homra S, Rosenberg J, Coffelt SB, Kittrell F, Zhang Y, Creighton CJ, Fuqua SA, Medina D, Machado HL. Macrophages promote the progression of premalignant mammary lesions to invasive cancer. Oncotarget. 2017 Aug 1;8(31):50731-50746. doi: 10.18632/oncotarget.14913. eCollection 2017 Aug 1. PubMed PMID: 28881599; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC5584199.
Sainz B Jr, Carron E, Vallespinós M, Machado HL. Cancer Stem Cells and Macrophages: Implications in Tumor Biology and Therapeutic Strategies. Mediators Inflamm. 2016;2016:9012369. doi: 10.1155/2016/9012369. Epub 2016 Feb 14. Review. PubMed PMID: 26980947; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC4769767.
Rahal OM, Machado HL, Montales MT, Pabona JM, Heard ME, Nagarajan S, Simmen RC. Dietary suppression of the mammary CD29(hi)CD24(+) epithelial subpopulation and its cytokine/chemokine transcriptional signatures modifies mammary tumor risk in MMTV-Wnt1 transgenic mice. Stem Cell Res. 2013 Nov;11(3):1149-62. doi: 10.1016/j.scr.2013.08.006. Epub 2013 Aug 15. PubMed PMID: 24012543; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC4034693.
Angelova M, Machado HL, Swan KF, Morris C, Sullivan DE. Extravillous Trophoblast Migration and Invasion Assay. Bio Protoc. 2013 Aug 5;3(15). doi: 10.21769/bioprotoc.840. PubMed PMID: 27547783; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC4991900.
Machado HL, Kittrell FS, Edwards D, White AN, Atkinson RL, Rosen JM, Medina D, Lewis MT. Separation by cell size enriches for mammary stem cell repopulation activity. Stem Cells Transl Med. 2013 Mar;2(3):199-203. doi: 10.5966/sctm.2012-0121. Epub 2013 Feb 13. PubMed PMID: 23408103; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3659766.
Publications
Mills KL, Gomes AM, Standlee CR, Rojo MD, Carmeliet P, Lin Z, Machado HL. Gas6 is dispensable for pubertal mammary gland development. PLoS One. 2018;13(12):e0208550. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0208550. eCollection 2018. PubMed PMID: 30533018; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC6289431.
Mammary gland biology, Breast cancer progression, Tumor Immunology
