Dr. Habas is a Professor in the Department of Biology and has joint appointments in the Department of Biochemistry at Temple University Medical School and the Cancer Biology Program at the Fox Chase Cancer Center. His laboratory focuses on unravelling the molecular mechanisms of how Wnt signaling regulates pattern formation during early vertebrate embryogenesis using the Xenopus and zebrafish models. Dr. Habas received his Ph.D. in Neurobiology from the State University of New York at Stony Brook and he performed post-doctoral studies at Harvard Medical School and the laboratory of Molecular Genetics at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. He has received a Basil O Connor Scholar Award from the March of Dimes Foundation, an American Heart Association Scholar Development Award and a US Presidential Early Career Award In Science And Engineering. His laboratory is funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health.

His research interests include Signal Transduction, Biochemistry, Gene Expression, Cell Biology, Developmental Biology and Cancer Biology. Dr. Habas laboratory currently dissecting the Wnt signaling pathway using a multidisciplinary approach, drawing on techniques from molecular biology, biochemistry, cell biology and embryology. Their primary model systems are the Xenopus laevis (frog) and Danio rerio (fish) embryos, along with mammalian cultured cells.