Svetlana Mojsov, Ph.D.
Research Associate Professor
A biochemist whose work has translated into widely used treatments for diabetes and weight loss, Mojsov’s long-standing interests are in understanding how peptides and small proteins regulate physiological processes in healthy and disease states. She has applied her expertise in the chemical synthesis of peptides and small proteins in numerous lines of research, including studies that led to the discovery of glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1), an incretin hormone produced by gut tissue that plays a key role in insulin secretion and glucose metabolism.
She is listed as co-inventor on a series of patents for the use of GLP-1 for treatment of diabetes that were licensed to the pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk. This work was later used to develop a new class of therapeutic medicines for treatment of Type 2 diabetes that are marketed under the trade names Victoza, Ozempic and Rybelsus. Victoza and Ozempic, approved for weight loss under trade names Saxenda and Wegovy, respectively, are now used by millions of individuals with Type 2 diabetes and obesity to control their glucose levels or lose weight.
Mojsov has launched additional studies of the function of GLP-1 in fish glucose metabolism, which is controlled by different regulatory networks than in mammals. During evolution, teleost fish underwent a whole genome duplication that gave rise to duplicated genes, including two glucagon genes that encode two preproglucagon proteins, one expressed in the intestines and a second one in the pancreatic islets. In fish, insulin is not a glucoregulatory hormone and GLP-1 is not an incretin. Instead, GLP-1 regulates glucose metabolism through its actions in the liver by a mechanism similar to glucagon. Like in mammals, GLP-1 is released in the brain and controls the feeding behavior of fish. Mojsov, in collaboration with Deena Oren from the Structural Biology Center at The Rockefeller University, has shown through analysis of existing three-dimensional structures that the biological effects of GLP-1 in fish are not transmitted by binding to a GLP-1 specific receptor, but instead through a receptor with dual ligand selectivity towards glucagon and GLP-1. It is the first and only example so far of a vertebrate G-protein coupled receptor (GPCR) with dual ligand specificity towards GLP-1 and glucagon.