Christopher Mason, Ph.D.

Professor of Physiology and Biophysics

  • Director, WorldQuant Initiative for Quantitative Prediction and WorldQuant Foundation Research Scholar
  • Professor of Computational Genomics in Computational Biomedicine in the Institute for Computational Biomedicine
  • Professor of Neuroscience in the Brain and Mind Institute (secondary appointment)

646-962-5643

1305 York Avenue, Room Y-13.15
New York, NY 10021

Lab website: http://www.masonlab.net

Techniques

Research Areas

Member of:

Research Summary:

We utilize computational and experimental methodologies to identify and characterize the essential genetic elements that guide the function of the human genome, with a particular emphasis on the elements that orchestrate the development of the human brain. Our lab creates detailed cell-specific molecular maps of genetic, epigenetic, transcriptional, and translational activity, creating a draft of the molecular recipe for the creation of the brain. We also develop methods to detect, catalog and functionally annotate variants in the genetic pathways that control developmental processes and how they are perturbed to create disease. We aim to understand of the functional elements of the human genome well enough to enable, eventually, the ability to repair, re-engineer, or fortify these genetic networks within human cells.

Recent Publications:

  1. Winer, DA, Du, H, Kim, J, Chang, V, Burke, M, Winer, S et al.. Astroimmunology: the effects of spaceflight and its associated stressors on the immune system. Nat Rev Immunol. 2025; :. doi: 10.1038/s41577-025-01226-6. PubMed PMID:41102553 .
  2. Karouia, F, de Oliveira, LC, Hameed, A, Simpson, A, Singh, N, Rekha, PD et al.. Genomic characterization of Microbacterium meiriae sp. nov., a novel bacterium isolated from the International Space Station. Sci Rep. 2025;15 (1):35770. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-13974-5. PubMed PMID:41087377 PubMed Central PMC12521503.
  3. Sharma, G, Munteanu, V, Ghiasi, NM, Banerjee, J, Varma, S, Foschini, L et al.. A decentralized future for the open-science databases. ArXiv. 2025; :. . PubMed PMID:41040803 PubMed Central PMC12486051.
  4. Sakharkar, A, Chen, R, LeRoy, E, Nelson, TM, Proszynski, J, Kim, J et al.. Multi-Omics Profiling of Individuals Sustaining Extreme Physical Stressors. Life (Basel). 2025;15 (9):. doi: 10.3390/life15091377. PubMed PMID:41010319 PubMed Central PMC12471032.
  5. Lee, R, Rayhun, A, Kim, JK, Meydan, C, Beheshti, A, Sporn, K et al.. Genomic Analysis of Cardiovascular Diseases Utilizing Space Omics and Medical Atlas. Genes (Basel). 2025;16 (9):. doi: 10.3390/genes16090996. PubMed PMID:41009942 PubMed Central PMC12469784.
  6. Sierra, MA, Ryon, K, Arikatla, MR, Elshafey, R, Bhaskar, H, Proszynski, J et al.. The Microbe Directory: a centralized database for biological interpretation of microbiome data. Database (Oxford). 2025;2025 :. doi: 10.1093/database/baaf060. PubMed PMID:40996703 PubMed Central PMC12462379.
  7. Lamm, ED, Babler, KM, Sharkey, ME, Amirali, A, Beaver, C, Boone, MM et al.. Inclusion of Physical-Chemical Water Quality Measurements Can Improve Associations between SARS-CoV-2 RNA Levels in Wastewater and COVID-19 Cases within Smaller Sewersheds. J Environ Eng (New York). 2025;151 (9):. doi: 10.1061/joeedu.eeeng-8138. PubMed PMID:40978681 PubMed Central PMC12445732.
  8. Barone, PD, Dzedzik, S, Kleinman, AS, Chin, CR, Meydan, C, Valencia, I et al.. Wild-type p53 overexpression in NPM1-mutated acute myeloid leukemia: potential implications for disease biology and therapy response. Haematologica. 2025; :. doi: 10.3324/haematol.2025.288054. PubMed PMID:40931876 .
  9. Prajapati, SC, Meydan, C, Neelamraju, Y, Wang, Z, Fan, H, Dunham, N et al.. CCAAT-enhancer binding protein delta functions as a tumor suppressor gene in acute myeloid leukemia. bioRxiv. 2025; :. doi: 10.1101/2025.08.25.670309. PubMed PMID:40909626 PubMed Central PMC12407753.
  10. Lei, H, Du, S, Tong, X, Chan, WL, Leung, MHY, Bøifot, KO et al.. Global biogeography of airborne viruses in public transit systems and their host interactions. Microbiome. 2025;13 (1):193. doi: 10.1186/s40168-025-02173-z. PubMed PMID:40883783 PubMed Central PMC12395665.
  11. Harbi, E, Mason, CE. Use of Protein Arginine Methyltransferase Inhibitors in Gliomas. JCO Precis Oncol. 2025;9 :e2500518. doi: 10.1200/PO-25-00518. PubMed PMID:40865032 .
  12. Jafari, H, Brown-Burke, F, Pray, B, Sloan, S, Helmig-Mason, J, Hout, I et al.. The novel immunocompetent Eµ-SOX11CCND1 mouse model phenotypically and molecularly resembles human mantle cell lymphoma. Clin Cancer Res. 2025; :. doi: 10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-25-0534. PubMed PMID:40857109 PubMed Central PMC12442894.
  13. McDaniel, JH, Patel, V, Olson, ND, He, HJ, He, Z, Cole, KD et al.. Correction: Development and extensive sequencing of a broadly-consented Genome in a Bottle matched tumor-normal pair. Sci Data. 2025;12 (1):1385. doi: 10.1038/s41597-025-05752-9. PubMed PMID:40781089 PubMed Central PMC12334583.
  14. Harbi, E, Yarar, E, Mason, CE, Aschner, M, Altundag, A. Intranasal Terpene Treatment for Glioblastoma: the Neuro-Oncological Potential of Perillyl Alcohol. Neurochem Res. 2025;50 (4):254. doi: 10.1007/s11064-025-04505-9. PubMed PMID:40728696 .
  15. Amirali, A, Sharkey, ME, Choudhary, S, Babler, KM, Beaver, CC, Biswas, P et al.. Long term assessment of SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater and the transition to evaluate additional viral targets. Sci Total Environ. 2025;995 :180096. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2025.180096. PubMed PMID:40712541 PubMed Central PMC12490206.
  16. Liu, S, Rodriguez, JS, Munteanu, V, Ronkowski, C, Sharma, NK, Alser, M et al.. Analysis of metagenomic data. Nat Rev Methods Primers. 2025;5 :. doi: 10.1038/s43586-024-00376-6. PubMed PMID:40688383 PubMed Central PMC12276902.
  17. McDaniel, JH, Patel, V, Olson, ND, He, HJ, He, Z, Cole, KD et al.. Development and extensive sequencing of a broadly-consented Genome in a Bottle matched tumor-normal pair. Sci Data. 2025;12 (1):1195. doi: 10.1038/s41597-025-05438-2. PubMed PMID:40670386 PubMed Central PMC12267650.
  18. Park, J, De Gregorio, R, Hissong, E, Ozcelik, E, Bartelo, N, Dezem, FS et al.. The Spatial Atlas of Human Anatomy (SAHA): A Multimodal Subcellular-Resolution Reference Across Human Organs. bioRxiv. 2025; :. doi: 10.1101/2025.06.16.658716. PubMed PMID:40611896 PubMed Central PMC12224548.
  19. Chen, X, Fang, LT, Chen, Z, Chen, W, Wu, H, Zhu, B et al.. A benchmarking study of copy number variation inference methods using single-cell RNA-sequencing data. Precis Clin Med. 2025;8 (2):pbaf011. doi: 10.1093/pcmedi/pbaf011. PubMed PMID:40584741 PubMed Central PMC12204187.
  20. Lili, L, Kunces, LJ, Meydan, C, Pesce, S, Afshin, EE, Rickard, N et al.. A multi-omic study profiles women with PCOS to reveal unique gut microbiome compositions. Precis Clin Med. 2025;8 (3):pbaf012. doi: 10.1093/pcmedi/pbaf012. PubMed PMID:40584174 PubMed Central PMC12205306.
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