Selective Autophagy in Liver Pathophysiology

This grand round has already taken place.

Our research investigates the role and impact of defective maintenance of protein homeostasis (proteostasis) linked to different human diseases including hepatic conditions. Disturbances in the systems that maintain liver proteostasis have been observed in hepatocellular carcinoma, our interest is to explore the extent to which loss of proteostasis in the steatotic liver constitutes a risk factor for development of HCC.

The Arias lab focusses specifically in chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA), a protein quality control system that mediates selective degradation of cytosolic proteins in lysosomes. The function and relevance of autophagy in cancer biology is a rapidly evolving area of research. Most of the recent studies in this topic have focused on the interplay of cancer and macroautophagy, the most extensively studied type of autophagy. However, we have growing evidence supporting that chaperone-mediated autophagy, is also important in the context of liver damage progression to HCC.

Our reseacrh is elucidating how functional impair of CMA contributes to liver pathology from non-alcoholic fatty liver (NAFLD) and if it increases HCC risk in steatotic liver. Additionally our findings are also helping in developing new approaches to preserve steatotic liver homeostasis and function and reduce its risk to HCC.

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Please contact the Grand Round coordinator listed below:

Nancy Strein
Department: Pathology
Phone: (631) 444-3000
Email: nancy.strein@stonybrookmedicine.edu