Xiaotao Zhang
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, NY·Medicine & Clinical Research
Fatty liver disease linked to obesity and diabetes, now called metabolic dysfunction–associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), is the most common chronic liver disease. It is a growing cause of cirrhosis (severe scarring), liver cancer and liver transplants.
- Fields
Medicine & Clinical Research
Public Health & Epidemiology
- Topics
metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease
fatty liver disease
liver fibrosis
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jun 2029
What they work on
- Estimate recruitment, retention and diet adherence in adults with MASLD and F2–F3 fibrosis, verifying adherence with plasma pipecolic acid, a blood marker of bean intake, within a randomized crossover trial.
- Measure the effect size and variability of navy-bean substitution on liver fat using MRI-PDFF, an MRI measure of liver fat fraction, with liver stiffness by elastography and the liver enzyme ALT as exploratory outcomes.
- Identify reproducible microbiome, plasma metabolomic and proteomic signatures linked to the bean substitution and to liver fat changes, to nominate biomarkers for a larger trial.
- Assess acceptability, tolerability and preferred food forms using patient-reported outcome surveys and brief interviews, to build a toolkit for real-world use across diverse populations.
More about the research
People who already have moderate-to-advanced scarring, called fibrosis stages F2–F3, have few safe and affordable treatment options. This project asks whether a simple food change, swapping some everyday calories for navy beans, is practical for these patients and shows early signs of benefit.
Why it matters
Adults with MASLD and F2–F3 liver fibrosis face high risks of cirrhosis, liver cancer and liver-related death, and many lack affordable treatment options. If navy-bean substitution proves feasible and shows early effects on liver fat, it could support a larger trial and eventually inform low-cost, food-based strategies that complement medicines. The biomarkers identified could also help select patients for future trials.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Peijian He
Georgia State University, GA·Medicine & Clinical Research
Test whether losing frataxin, a mitochondrial iron-handling protein, causes ferroptosis (iron-driven cell death) and liver injury in MASLD mouse models, and whether restoring frataxin prevents this damage.
Jian-Min Yuan
University of Pittsburgh, PA·Public Health & Epidemiology
Enroll and follow at least 1,000 patients with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and advanced fibrosis, tracking liver stiffness by transient elastography every six months for up to five years.
Banrida Wahlang
University of Louisville, KY·Pharmacology
Determine how exposure to a mixture of persistent organic pollutants, built to match current human exposure patterns, causes liver and metabolic damage differently in males and females.
The school
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai: 45 labs on PI Pages, $1.0B a year on research, 62 research doctorates a year.
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