Heather L. Machado PhD

Dr. Machado received her B.S. degree in biological sciences at the University of New Orleans in 1999. She earned a Ph.D. in molecular and cellular biology in 2005 from Tulane University School of Medicine, where she studied the molecular mechanisms that regulate trophoblast invasion and the consequences of cytomegalovirus infection during early pregnancy.

In 2013, she completed her postdoctoral studies in the laboratory of Jeffrey M. Rosen at Baylor College of Medicine, where she focused on understanding the role normal and cancer stem cells in mammary gland development and in human breast cancer.She joined the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Tulane School of Medicine in 2013, and is a member of the Center for Stem Cell Research and Regenerative Medicine. Dr. Machado's laboratory is interested in understanding how inflammatory cells and cancer stem cells interact to regulate the switch from premalignant to invasive breast cancer.