The main focus of the Doolittle Lab is to study the development and intercellular signaling of senescent cells in the bone microenvironment. Cellular senescence is a hallmark of aging defined by a lack of proliferation paired with an inflammatory phenotype. Senescent cells accumulate during skeletal aging and contribute to age-related deterioration in bone. However, besides the negative effects on the physical tissue, much remains unknown surrounding the intercellular signaling of skeletal senescent cells. This is particularly important as a majority of the body’s blood cells arise from stem cells within the bone marrow, which are likely directly exposed to aged senescent cells in the skeleton. It is also unclear if the persistence of senescent skeletal cells is due to their ability to evade clearance by the body’s immune response, similar to cancer cells. Therefore, our lab is investigating these molecular interactions between senescent skeletal cells and immune cells through the application of transcriptomics, proteomics, and live-cell imaging.