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Megan Madonna

Assistant Research Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering
Biomedical Engineering
140 Science Dr., Gross Hall 379, Durham, NC 27708

Current Appointments & Affiliations


Assistant Research Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering · 2023 - Present Biomedical Engineering, Pratt School of Engineering

In the News


Published September 30, 2025
Duke Instructors are Changing the Narrative around Grading at Duke
Published March 28, 2025
Championing Innovative Grading and Assessment at Duke
Published May 8, 2024
Ignite Helps Students Illuminate—and Solve—Problems in Their Own Community

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Recent Publications


Multi-probe Metabolic Fluorescence Microscopy Captures Poor Tumor Immunogenicity

Conference Optical Molecular Probes Imaging and Drug Delivery Omp 2025 in Proceedings Optica Biophotonics Congress 2025 Part of Optica Biophotonics Congress Optics in the Life Sciences · January 1, 2025 Visualizing complex tumor-immune metabolic interactions is imperative to understanding cancer progression. Cocultures of 4T1 tumor cells and CD8+ T cells were imaged for glucose uptake and mitochondrial metabolism. Results point to poor immunogenic tumor p ... Full text Cite

Optical imaging reveals chemotherapy-induced metabolic reprogramming of residual disease and recurrence.

Journal Article Sci Adv · April 5, 2024 Fewer than 20% of triple-negative breast cancer patients experience long-term responses to mainstay chemotherapy. Resistant tumor subpopulations use alternative metabolic pathways to escape therapy, survive, and eventually recur. Here, we show in vivo, lon ... Full text Link to item Cite

Development of a multi-scale imaging tool to quantify in vivo metabolic heterogeneity

Conference Progress in Biomedical Optics and Imaging Proceedings of SPIE · January 1, 2024 We developed an approach to quantify intra-tumoral metabolic heterogeneity of in vivo tumor models by leveraging a computationally designed multi-scale microscope and a suite of exogenous fluorescent contrast agents to provide functional and structural inf ... Full text Cite
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Recent Grants


A single shot therapy will accelerate the elimination of breast cancer

ResearchResearch Scientist · Awarded by United States Army Medical Research Acquisition Activity · 2024 - 2028

Development of CapCell Scope for Metabolic Imaging of Tissue Heterogeneity and Therapy Response

ResearchCo Investigator · Awarded by National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering · 2019 - 2028

Ignite: Place-Based Human Centered Design Framework to Promote Engineering and Community-Identity

ResearchPrincipal Investigator · Awarded by Burroughs Wellcome Fund · 2024 - 2027

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Education, Training & Certifications


Duke University · 2020 Ph.D.