The multi-disciplinary research of the Shalek Lab aims to create and implement broadly-applicable methods to study and engineer cellular responses in tissues, to drive biological discovery and improve prognostics, diagnostics, and therapeutics for autoimmune, infectious, and cancerous diseases.

He then performed graduate work in chemical physics developing arrays of nanowires as cellular "syringes" and electrochemical probes under the direction of Hongkun Park at Harvard University.

[3][4][5][6] As an independent investigator, Shalek and his lab have helped scale and simplify single cell genomics to study complex, low-input clinical specimens around the world.

With respect to technology development, the lab brings together areas of research in genomics, chemical biology, and nanotechnology to establish accessible approaches to profile and control cells and their interactions.

[15][17][18][19][25][35] From these observations and those of others, the lab aims to understand how disease alters tissue function at the cellular level and realize therapeutic and prophylactic interventions to reestablish or support human health.