Faqian Li
University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, TX·Medicine & Clinical Research
Heart failure is a major health problem, and the molecular events that drive it remain poorly understood, which slows the search for targeted treatments. In many heart diseases, genes and signals normally active only in the developing fetal heart switch back on.
- Fields
Medicine & Clinical Research
Physiology
Genetics
- Topics
heart failure
cardiac hypertrophy
cardiac remodeling
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Mar 2027
What they work on
- Profile heart-specific TCF7L2 isoforms and their target genes in failing human hearts from patients with coronary artery disease and idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy, to see how they direct β-catenin-driven gene activity.
- Use genetic mouse models to test whether TCF7L2 is required for cardiac remodeling and dysfunction after pressure overload.
- Test whether switching on TCF7L2 in adult mouse hearts is sufficient to cause cardiac remodeling and heart failure.
- Evaluate whether drugs that block TCF7L2 from binding β-catenin can prevent heart failure after pressure overload or TCF7L2 induction.
More about the research
One of these is the Wnt/β-catenin pathway, a signaling route involved in almost every aspect of development and in many diseases. The lab's data show that this pathway plays a key role in heart failure in humans and animal models. The question here is how its signal reaches the genes it controls.
Why it matters
Heart failure lacks treatments aimed at its underlying molecular causes. By testing whether blocking the interaction between heart-specific TCF7L2 isoforms and β-catenin can prevent or reverse harmful heart remodeling, this work could point to a new drug target. That could eventually benefit patients with heart failure from coronary artery disease or dilated cardiomyopathy.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
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Michael Kapiloff
Stanford University, CA·Physiology
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The school
University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio: 15 labs on PI Pages, $313M a year on research, 149 research doctorates a year.
More about University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio
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