Dr. Kaplan is a physician scientist who developed the concept of the pre-metastatic niche describing the changes in distant microenvironments in response to a growing tumor that create a niche environment conducive to disseminating tumor cell survival and growth resulting in clinically relevant metastasis. Dr Kaplan has an active translational and clinical research program focusing on developing novel biomarkers and targets of the metastatic microenvironment and developing new cell therapies to modulate the microenivronment to limit cancer progression.