The Maciejowski lab is currently focused on how the innate immune system senses and responds to cancer-intrinsic aberrations. The innate immune system is an ancient form of host defense that depends on a limited number of encoded receptors that can recognize pathogenic or disease features to launch a defense response that often connects to adaptive immunity. Current research interests in the Maciejowski lab include understanding how defenses raised by the innate immune system impact cancer genome evolution. Other areas of work include projects seeking to understand how cancer cells can adapt to, evade, or co-opt innate immunity to facilitate tumor growth. The lab approaches these questions using human cancer cell line and mouse cancer models. The long-term goals of his research are to better understand the fundamental forces shaping cancer cell fitness and to use this knowledge to build better therapies. The Maciejowski lab is part of the Molecular Biology Program at the Sloan Kettering Institute.