Mariella G. Filbin

Mariella G. Filbin, MD, PhD is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and serves as Co-Director of the Brain Tumor Center and Research Director of the Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Program at Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer and Blood Disorders Center. She is also an Attending Physician in the Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Blood Disorders Center, specializing in pediatric brain tumors including brain tumors, ependymoma, and glioma.

Dr. Filbin received her medical and doctoral training from the Medical University of Graz in Austria. She completed her pediatric residency at Boston Children's Hospital and a fellowship in pediatric hematology/oncology at Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer and Blood Disorders Center.

Dr. Filbin's research focuses on pediatric brain tumors, particularly high-grade gliomas and malignant embryonal brain tumors. She combines single-cell genetics and transcriptomics with gene editing, epigenetic, stem cell, and pharmacologic methods to identify cellular states and hierarchies underlying tumorigenesis. Her work emphasizes utilizing single-cell transcriptomics to determine tumor architecture in pediatric brain tumors and exploring downstream effects of epigenetic driver mutations in DIPG and high-grade gliomas. Recent publications reveal her expertise in cellular hierarchies, immune landscapes, and therapeutic vulnerabilities in these challenging tumors.

• Jan Paradise Chair in Brain Cancer Research

Dr. Filbin joined the faculty at Dana-Farber/Boston Children's as a pediatric neuro-oncologist in July 2017. Her research program receives funding to investigate cellular networks of tumor dependencies in pediatric brain tumors with the goal of finding new targeted therapies. She collaborates extensively with researchers across institutions to advance understanding and treatment of these challenging cancers, with numerous grants supporting her innovative approaches to studying tumor heterogeneity and identifying novel therapeutic targets.

Dr. Filbin leads a research laboratory focused on pediatric neuro-oncology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, where her team employs cutting-edge genomic and epigenomic approaches to study tumor heterogeneity and identify novel therapeutic targets for children with brain cancer. Her lab works closely with the Brain Tumor Center and Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Program to translate basic science discoveries into clinical applications for patients.