Andrew Koff

Head of the Laboratory of Cell Cycle Regulation
Sloan-Kettering Institute
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
New York, NY

Professor, Molecular Biology Program of Weill Cornell Medical College
Cornell University
New York, NY

B.S., Biochemistry, Stony Brook University
Ph.D., 1990; advisor: Peter Tegtmeyer
Postdoctoral Fellow, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center,
P.I., James Roberts

Website

Research Interests

My laboratory is interested in the mechanisms that control the decision of mammalian cells to either commit to the mitotic proliferative cycle or exit the cell cycle and differentiate, and the effect that mis-regulation of this decision has on development of a tissue and on tumor growth. Our current efforts are focused on the activities of members of a family of proteins that inhibit cyclin-dependent kinases. Specifically, we are determining how a low p27KIP1 status accelerates the progression of tumors, whether deregulated cdk2 activity explains the cell cycle-independent tumor suppressive properties of p27, and how p21 drives tumor progression. We are also interested in identifying non-cell cycle-associated functions of cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors that contribute to cell differentiation.