The Maddipati Lab studies how the metabolic and immune environments of host tissues drive metastasis, tumor progression, and therapeutic response.

Across every cancer, tumors arising in different regions of an organ, or seeding different metastatic sites, acquire distinct clinical and molecular phenotypes despite carrying similar mutations. The local tissue context, including anatomic position, nutrient availability, and the surrounding immune environment, shapes how these alterations drive tumor growth, metastasis, and therapeutic response.

Our goal is to define how tumor heterogeneity, metabolism, and immunity intersect within the local tissue environment to drive metastatic progression in pancreatic and other gastrointestinal cancers, and to translate these insights into new immune- and metabolism-directed therapies. To address these questions, we have developed novel genetic and metabolomic approaches that allow us to control where tumors form in living tissue and to resolve the metabolism of individual cell populations within tumors.