David Pellman is awarded the DFCI Discovery Award!

Dr. David Pellman received the Discovery Award for demonstrating scientific excellence and institutional impact by consistently pairing fundamental cell biology with innovative, quantitatively rigorous methods to reveal how cell division errors can rapidly reshape cancer genomes. Dr. Pellman’s laboratory has made foundational discoveries demonstrating how extensive DNA damage can arise over short timescales. By developing a method that combines live-cell imaging and single-cell whole genome sequencing (Look-Seq) the lab showed that a catastrophic mutational event called chromothripsis can occur when lagging chromosomes are isolated into micronuclei rather than being incorporated into the main nucleus. Dr. Pellman’s research program continues to illuminate how cell division errors can trigger cascades of genome instability that are central to cancer evolution, and how aberrant nuclear architecture can drive lasting molecular consequences. These discoveries strengthen the institute’s basic science foundation for understanding genome instability and its translational relevance.