Principal Investigator
Elijah Mena, Ph.D.

Elijah received a B.S. in Chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of California, Berkeley. During his doctoral training in the laboratory of Michael Rape, he defined a protein quality control pathway by which cells monitor the integrity of a conserved protein dimerization domain.

As a postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of Stephen Elledge at Harvard Medical School, Elijah applied genetic screening approaches to uncover mechanisms of protein degradation, including a key ubiquitin-independent pathway that had remained poorly understood for decades.

In December 2025, Elijah joined the faculty at UT Southwestern Medical Center as an Assistant Professor and Endowed Scholar in Medical Science. He is the recipient of the NIH K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award and a Recruitment Award from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT).