Research Instructor in Medicine
| Office Location: | 843 SW Tower | |
| Mailing Address: | 660 S. Euclid Ave. Campus Box 8127 St. Louis, MO 63110 |
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| Phone: | (314) 362-4453 | |
| Fax: | (314) 362-7641 | |
| E-mail address: |
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Biography
Irfan Lodhi received his PhD in cellular and molecular biology from the University of Michigan Medical School, where he studied signaling pathways involved in insulin-stimulated glucose transport with Dr. Alan Saltiel. In 2007, he joined Dr. Clay Semenkovich's laboratory at Washington University School of Medicine as a postdoctoral research fellow to study lipid metabolism. Dr. Lodhi joined the faculty as an instructor in the Department of Medicine in 2011.
Research Interests
Metabolic disorders, such as diabetes and obesity are enormous clinical problems with limited treatment options. Fatty acid synthase (FAS), a large multidomain enzyme that catalyzes the first committed step in de novo lipogenesis by converting malonyl-CoA to palmitate, has been implicated in these disorders. Emerging studies suggest that fatty acid synthase is involved in the generation of metabolic signals that affect disease risk. My studies have focused on the role FAS-mediated lipogenesis in the endogenous activation of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs), a family of ligand-activated transcription factors important for lipid and glucose metabolism. Our recent studies suggest that FAS in liver is part of a lipogenic pathway involved in the generation of a phospholipid ligand for PPARalpha, a key transcriptional regulator of fatty acid oxidation. We are now studying phospholipid synthetic pathways downstream of FAS. These studies may lead to novel therapeutic approaches for treatment of these ubiquitous metabolic disorders.
Selected Publications
- Lodhi IJ, Wei, X and Semenkovich CF (2011). Lipoexpediency: De novo lipogenesis as a metabolic signal transmitter. Trends in Endocrinology & Metabolism 22(1): 1-8.
- Schnieder JG, Yang Z, Chakravarthy MV, Lodhi IJ, Wei X, Turk J and Semenkovich CF (2010). Macrophage Fatty Acid Synthase Deficiency Decreases Diet-Induced Atherlosclerosis. Journal of Biological Chemistry 285 (30): 23398-23409.
- Chakravarthy MV*, Lodhi IJ*, Yin L, Malapaka RV, Xu HE, Turk J and Semenkovich CF (2009). Identification of a Physiologically Relevant Endogenous Ligand for PPARa in Liver. Cell 138 (3): 476-488. *Contributed equally.
- Lodhi IJ and Semenkovich CF (2009). Why we should put clothes on mice. Cell Metabolism 9 (2): 111-112.
- Lodhi IJ*, Bridges D*, Chiang SH, Zhang Y, Cheng A, Geletka LM, Weisman LS, and Saltiel AR (2008). Insulin Stimulates Phosphatidylinositol 3-Phosphate Production via the Activation of Rab5. Molecular Biology of the Cell 19(7): 2718-2728. *Contributed equally.
- Lodhi IJ, Chiang SH, Chang L, Vollenweider D, Watson RT, Inoue, M, Pessin JE and Saltiel AR (2007). Gapex-5, a Rab31 guanine nucleotide exchange factor that regulates Glut4 trafficking in adipocytes. Cell Metabolism 5(1): 59-72.
- Su X, Lodhi IJ, Saltiel AR, and Stahl, PD (2006). Insulin-stimulated interaction between insulin receptor substrate 1 and p85alpha and activation of protein kinase b/akt require rab5. Journal of Biological Chemistry 281(38): 27982-27990.
