UTMThe University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center · Biology
Kwong Cancer Lab
Lawrence Kwong · Houston, Texas
Research Focus
Dr. Lawrence Kwong's lab studies cholangiocarcinoma, a serious form of bile duct cancer. The lab focuses on understanding how cancer cells change their identities, a process known as lineage plasticity, which can affect how aggressive the cancer is and how well it responds to treatment. By exploring the genetic and molecular underpinnings of this plasticity, the lab aims to identify new biomarkers and treatment strategies to improve patient outcomes.
cholangiocarcinomalineage plasticitydrug resistancebioinformaticsepigenomicstumor microenvironmenttherapeutic targetsmouse modelsspatial genomics
Research Aims
3AIM 01Dissect the regulators of lineage plasticity in cholangiocarcinoma cells.
AIM 02Investigate the roles of tumor suppressor genes ARID1A and BAP1 in lineage plasticity.
AIM 03Construct a lineage plasticity landscape to integrate sequencing data with functional assays.
Skills the Lab Values
RNA sequencingchromatin analysisbioinformaticsmouse modelingplasmid technologycell culturespatial epigenomicsgene knockout techniquesdrug response assays
Output against the department
Publications326top 16% of dept.167th of 1,033
this lab
most publishedleast published
Citations15ktop 26% of dept.264th of 1,033
this lab
most citedleast cited
Career totals from OpenAlex, compared against labs that share a department. A department spans everything from one paper to tens of thousands, so bar heights are on a log scale — otherwise the largest lab would flatten every other bar to a line.