Shannon Bailey
University of Alabama at Birmingham, AL·Physiology
Alcohol-related liver disease (ALD) is the leading cause of death from long-term heavy drinking in the United States, and there are no effective therapies. One of the first things alcohol damages in liver cells is the mitochondrion, the cell's energy-producing compartment.
- Fields
Physiology
Medicine & Clinical Research
Biochemistry
- Topics
alcohol-related liver disease
alcoholic liver disease
circadian rhythm
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Mar 2028
What they work on
- Establish whether chronic alcohol consumption disrupts 24-hour rhythms in liver mitochondrial energy production, including the activity of cytochrome c oxidase, the rate-limiting enzyme of respiration, in alcohol-fed mice.
- Define how the liver-cell clock factors BMAL1 and E4BP4 contribute to alcohol-induced mitochondrial dysfunction and liver injury, using mice with these genes altered specifically in liver cells.
- Test whether reinstating liver clock activity during chronic alcohol use prevents mitochondrial dysfunction and the development of alcohol-related liver injury.
More about the research
Exactly how this damage happens, and how much it contributes to disease, is unclear. The project links this damage to the body's internal 24-hour clock, the molecular circadian clock that helps organs respond to stresses.
Why it matters
Patients with alcohol-related liver disease currently have no effective drug treatments. By showing whether a disrupted liver clock drives mitochondrial energy failure, this work may provide the preclinical basis for new therapies. These could include treatments aimed at mitochondria or timed to the body's daily rhythms, for ALD and other serious liver diseases.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Ankita Srivastava
Thomas Jefferson University, PA·Physiology
Test whether chronic ethanol upsets the balance between metabolic adjustments and hepatocyte division after partial hepatectomy (PHx, surgical removal of part of the liver) in rats.
Kristofer Fritz
University of Colorado Denver/Anschutz Medical Campus, CO·Pharmacology
Characterize how chronic alcohol metabolism changes thiol redox signaling, the on-off switching of cysteine residues in proteins, in liver cells, using redox proteomics and bioinformatics.
Xiaoqin Wu
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, TX·Microbiology & Immunology·Early-career
Characterize liver immune cell populations and cell death after Gao-binge alcohol feeding in Mlkl bone-marrow chimeric mice, using flow cytometry of isolated non-parenchymal liver cells.
The school
University of Alabama at Birmingham: 45 labs on PI Pages, $866M a year on research, 166 research doctorates a year.
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