The rockefeller university

Event Details

Type

Friday Lecture Series

Speaker(s)

Gerard Karsenty, M.D., Ph.D., Paul A. Marks Professor and chair, department of genetics and development, Columbia University Medical Center

Speaker bio(s)

One of the most unexpected and significant contributions of mouse genetics to vertebrate biology has been to restore its importance to a discipline that had progressively fallen out of favor: whole-organism physiology. This was achieved in part through the identification of novel hormones and novel endocrine organs. Dr. Karsenty's laboratory has used the unique ability of mouse genetics to uncover functionally important connections between organs to ask the following question: Does bone have any other function besides making bone? Addressing this question through genetic and molecular means has revealed that bone is an endocrine organ that regulates a growing number of apparently unrelated physiological processes. Dr. Karsenty will review some of the known endocrine functions of bone, will present newly identified ones, will explore their therapeutic potentials and will begin to address the question of why bone affects so many different physiological processes.

 

Dr. Karsenty's scientific career has been devoted to studying the biology of the skeleton. His work covers the gamut from cell differentiation to endocrine functions of bone and has provided in multiple occasions a molecular explanation of human diseases. After having identified and studied the function of the master gene of bone formation in mice and in humans, Dr. Karsenty has focused the work of his laboratory on the physiology of the skeleton. Specifically he was interested in testing whether bone has any other physiological functions besides making bone. Based on cell biology and medical grounds he hypothesized that there must be a coordinated regulation of bone mass energy metabolism and reproduction. Exploring all aspects of this hypothesis allowed his laboratory to reveal the existence of a central control of bone mass, to define its molecular mechanisms, and to demonstrate that bone is an endocrine organ. His current work aims at defining all the endocrine functions of bone with the goal to determine whether some of them may have a therapeutic relevance in frequent degenerative diseases.

 

Dr. Karsenty received his M.D. from them medical school of Paris V in 1980 and his Ph.D. from the medical school of Paris VI in 1984. He was a fellow in endocrine and internal medicine at Paris Public Hospitals and a postdoc at The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. He was on the faculty of the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center and Baylor College of Medicine before joining the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University Medical Center in 2006. Dr. Karsenty is a member of the U.S. Insititue of Medicine and the French Academy of Sciences and has been the recipient of the William F. Neuman Award, the Herbert Fleisch Achievement Award, the Jacobaeus Prize, the Richard Lounsbery Award and the Lee C. Howley Prize for Arthritis Research, among other honors.

Open to

Public

Reception

Refreshments, 3:15 p.m. - 3:45 p.m., Abby Lounge

Contact

Linda Hanssler

Phone

(212) 327-7714

Sponsor

Linda Hanssler
(212) 327-7714
lhanssler@rockefeller.edu

Readings

http://librarynews.rockefeller.edu/?p=3667