Dr. Mengcheng Shen joined the Department of Medicine in the Cardiovascular Division as an Assistant Professor in May 2025. He earned his PhD from the University of Alberta, where his research focused on extracellular matrix remodeling in aortic aneurysm and heart failure. He completed his postdoctoral training and was subsequently promoted to Instructor at the Stanford Cardiovascular Institute. At Stanford, he filed several patents for robust differentiation protocols to generate diverse cardiovascular cell types. By integrating these physiologically relevant models with single-cell/spatial multiomics and CRISPR-based gene editing/high-throughput screens, he investigated the impact of genetic variants and anti-cancer drugs on the pathogenesis of congenital and acquired cardiovascular diseases.
Dr. Shen’s research has been published in high-impact journals, including Cell, Cell Stem Cell, Circulation, Circulation Research, Nature Cardiovascular Research, PNAS, and ATVB. In 2023, he was awarded the prestigious NIH NHLBI K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award. In the Department of Medicine and Center for Cardiovascular Research at WashU Medicine, Dr. Shen will focus on developing high-throughput stem cell- and CRSIPR screen-based platforms to identify novel genetic variant- and drug-induced cardiovascular pathologies, advancing precision cardiovascular medicine. His key interests are stem cell biology, cardio-oncology, CRISPR screens, genetic cardiovascular pathologies and regenerative medicine.