Originally from Puerto Rico, Dr. Joel Encarnación-Rosado earned his Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus, where he was a RISE and MARC NIH fellow. After college, he moved to Cleveland to join the Postbaccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP) at Case Western Reserve University. There, he began studying the role of the tumor microenvironment in drug resistance in pancreatic cancer, a topic that remains a priority in his research.
Dr. Encarnación-Rosado later completed his Ph.D. at New York University Grossman School of Medicine under the mentorship of Dr. Alec Kimmelman, supported by an HHMI Gilliam Fellowship. As a Ph.D. student, he focused on identifying metabolic vulnerabilities in pancreatic cancer across various models.
Currently, he is a postdoctoral fellow at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in the laboratory of Dr. Christina Towers. His research explores the interplay between metabolic reprogramming and pancreatic cancer, with a particular focus on autophagy—a cellular process of self-digestion and recycling. He investigates how pancreatic cancer cells adapt to autophagy inhibition at both the single-cell and organelle levels.
Beyond his research, Dr. Encarnación-Rosado is committed to mentoring, particularly supporting trainees from underrepresented backgrounds to foster inclusion in the biomedical research community. As he begins his term on the AACR Associate Member Council (AMC), he aspires to develop resources that support trainees transitioning into graduate school.