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Golnaz Vahedi, PhD

Associate Professor of Genetics

  • Member, Institute For Immunology and Immune Health, Penn Medicine
  • Core member, Penn Epigenetics Institute, Penn Medicine
  • Member, Institute for Diabetes, Obesity and Metabolism Institute, Penn Medicine
  • Member, Abramson Cancer Center, Penn Medicine
  • Deputy Director of Innovation and Technology, Institute for Immunology & Immune Health, Penn Medicine
  • Co-Director, Penn Epigenetics Institute, Penn Medicine

Department: Genetics


Graduate Group Affiliations


Contact Information

314 BRB II/III
421 Curie Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Email: vahedi@pennmedicine.upenn.edu


I3H Keywords

  • Precision Immunology and Measuring Immune Health
  • Systems Immunology and Genomics

Publications

Pubmed Link


Links


Education

  • B.Sc. (Electrical Engineering)
    Sharif University of Technology, 2001
  • M.Sc. (Electrical Engineering)
    University of Alberta, Canada, 2005
  • Ph.D. (Electrical Engineering)
    Texas A&M University, Texas, 2009

Post-Graduate Training

  • Postdoctoral Research Fellow
    National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD (Mentor: Dr. John O'Shea), 2009 - 2014

Description of Research Expertise

The overarching goal of the Vahedi laboratory is to understand the molecular mechanisms through which genomic information in our immune cells is interpreted in normal development and further dissect how common genetic variation can lead to misinterpretation of the genetic material in immune mediated diseases. The multidisciplinary nature of our laboratory allows us to exploit cutting-edge computational and experimental approaches and generate unbiased maps of genome organization in primary immune cells in humans and mice. We further follow our hypothesis-generating yet unbiased efforts with experiments dissecting the mechanisms of our predictions using genome editing in mice or cell lines which provides us with an unparalleled opportunity to rigorously define the link between genetics and chromatin organization.

Description of ITMAT Expertise

Human genetics, epigenetics, autoimmune diseases

Selected Publications

  • Jay, A., Pondevida, C.M. and Vahedi, G. : The epigenetic landscape of fate decisions in T cells Nature Immunology March 2025
  • Patil, A.R., Schug, J., Liu, C., Lahori, D., Descamps, H.C., the Human Pancreas Analysis Consortium, Naji, A., Kaestner, K.H., Faryabi, R.B., Vahedi, G. : Modeling Type 1 Diabetes progression from single-cell transcriptomic measurements in human islets Cell Reports Medicine 21 : 101535, May 2024
  • Goldman N., Chandra A., Johnson I., Sullivan M.A., Patil A.R., Vanderbeck A., Jay A., Zhou Y., Ferrari E.K., Mayne L., Aguilan J., Xue H.H., Faryabi R.B., Wherry E.J., Sidoli S., Maillard I. and Vahedi G. : Intrinsically disordered domain of transcription factor TCF-1 is required for T cell developmental fidelity Nature Immunology 24 : 1698-1710, October 2023
  • Chandra# A., Yoon# S., Michieletto# M.F., Goldman N., Ferrari E.K., Abedi M., Johnson I., Fasolino M., Pham K., Joannas L., Kee B.L., Henao-Mejia* J, and Vahedi* G., #co-first authors, *co-corresponding authors : Quantitative control of Ets1 dosage through a multi-enhancer hub promotes Th1 cell differentiation and protects from allergic inflammation Immunity 58 : 1451-1467, July 2023
  • Wang# W., Chandra# A., Goldman# N., Yoon# S., Ferrari# E.K., Nguyen S.C., Joyce E.F., Vahedi G., #co-first authors : TCF-1 promotes chromatin interactions across topologically associating domains in T cell progenitors Nature Immunology 23 : 1052-1062, July 2022
  • Yoon, S., Chandra, A. and Vahedi, G. : Stripenn detects architectural stripes from chromatin conformation data using computer vision Nature Communications 13 : 1602, March 2022
  • Fasolino M., Schwartz G.W., Patil A.R., Mongia A., Golson M.L., Wang Y.J., Morgan A., Liu C., Schug J., Liu J., Wu M., Traum D., Kondo A., May C.L., Goldman N., Wang W., Feldman M., Moore J.H., Japp A.S., Betts M.R.; HPAP Consortium, Faryabi R.B., Naji A., Kaestner K.H., Vahedi G. : Single-cell multi-omics analysis of human pancreatic islets reveals novel cellular states in Type 1 Diabetes Nature Metabolism 4 : 284-299, February 2022 Notes: Cited > 111
  • Fasolino M., Goldman N., Wang W., Cattau B., Zhou Y., Petrovic J., Link V.M., Cote A., Chandra A., Silverman M., Joyce E.F., Little S.C., the HPAP Consortium, Kaestner K.H., Naji A., Raj A., Henao-Mejia J., Faryabi R.B., and Vahedi G. : Genetic Variation in Type 1 Diabetes Reconfigure the 3D Chromatin Organization of T Cells Immunity 52(2) : 257-274, February 2020 Notes: Featured on journal's cover. Highlighted on Spotlight in Trends Immunology.
  • Wang W., Fasolino M., Cattau B., Goldman N., Kong W., Frederick M., McCright S., Kiani K., Fraietta J.A., Vahedi G. : Joint Profiling of Chromatin Accessibility and CAR-T Integration Site Analysis at Population and Single-cell Levels. Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences 117(10) : 5442-5452, March 2020
  • Johnson J.L., Georgakilas G., Petrovic J., Kurachi M., Cai S., Harly C., Pear W.S., Bhandoola A., Wherry E.J., Vahedi G. : Lineage-determining transcription factor TCF-1 initiates the epigenetic identity of T cells. Immunity 48(2) : 243-257, February 2018 Notes: Featured on journal's cover and received a News and Views. Cited > 222