Assistant Professor

Molecular and Systems Biology

Geisel School of Medicine

Dartmouth College

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Dr. McKenna's lab is interested in how cells grow and divide to form complex structures, such as the transformation from the zygote to an adult human or from a transformed cell into a tumor mass. To study these processes, we develop technologies to trace pattern of cell divisions which recovers the lineage of each cell. This information can be combined with other measures of cell state such as single-cell transcriptomic data to develop a rich picture of how choices are made in development and how this process is dysregulated in diseases such as cancer. 

​Dr. McKenna earned his undergraduate degree from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and a masters  in bioinformatics from Boston University. He completed his doctoral studies at the University of Washington in 2017.