Zach Gerhart-Hines

Signals or cues from the environment, diet, circadian clock, and other organs exert substantial control over the plasticity and function of adipose tissue. The overarching goal of my group is to uncover how these diverse 'inputs' converge on adipocytes to uniquely shape adipose tissue biology and coordinate organismal energy metabolism. Specifically, we focus on identifying cell surface receptors, intracellular enzymes, and transporters that represent key regulatory nodes in influencing adipose tissue catabolism. By combining global gene, protein, metabolite, and lipid profiling with cutting-edge in vivo physiological phenotyping and pharmacological engineering, we believe we are ideally poised to make transformative breakthroughs in the basic understanding of adipose biology and to develop innovative strategies for counteracting metabolic disease.