About This Lab
Life on Earth is not random. It follows a rhythm – a circadian rhythm. Research in the Koronowskilab aims to better understand how circadian rhythm influences health and disease.
The most fascinating thing about circadian rhythm is that it is part of our biological program. Studies have shown that people living in caves without any way to track time still have rhythms! And therein lies the problem. In modern society, we have transcended the need for circadian rhythm, but we still have it. And now, with technological advances, life is a 24/7 ordeal, meaning that our lifestyle is often at odds with our natural circadian rhythm.
Disruption of circadian rhythm is associated with increased risk of metabolic, cardiovascular, and neurological diseases, as well as certain cancers. Figuring out precisely how disruption of circadian rhythm lowers overall health will allow us to come up with treatments that can help adapt our bodies to the challenges we face today. It also has the potential to help us treat the diseases associated with circadian disruption.
The Koronowski lab is particularly interested in why disruption of circadian rhythm increases the risk for metabolic disease, including fatty liver disease, diabetes, and obesity. Organs that participate in digestion by breaking down food, releasing insulin or storing nutrients rely on circadian rhythm to optimize metabolism. Our goal is to find the molecules (e.g., DNA, RNA, protein, metabolite) that are critical for this process and see if they can be targeted by a drug or a novel therapy to prevent or treat metabolic disease. We are also interested in the molecules that link circadian rhythm disruption with Alzheimer’s disease and breast cancer.
Our work is at the very basic end of the research spectrum; we identify how a molecule/therapy works and then test its effectiveness in animals. These types of studies are essential to eventually get to a clinical trial in humans. To do our work, we culture different types of cells (e.g., liver cells, muscle cells) and perform experiments in mice that lack a natural circadian rhythm or have a disrupted rhythm. In the laboratory, we perform molecular biology and collaborate with over researchers who have additional tools and skillsets.
