Department of Systems Biology
Harvard Medical School
Boston, Massachusetts
Assembling the Components and Circuitry for Mitochondrial Biogenesis
(Oct. 6, 8:55 AM )
Presentation Summary
Dr. Mootha is an Assistant Professor of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School and an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Center for Human Genetic Research at the Massachusetts General Hospital. He is also a Senior Associate Member of the Broad Institute of Harvard and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Dr. Mootha completed his MD with Honors in 1998 at Harvard Medical School in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, where his thesis work was focused on mitochondrial physiology. He subsequently completed his internship and residency in Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in 2001. He then conducted his postdoctoral research at the Whitehead Institute-MIT Center for Genome Research.
Dr. Mootha’s research group uses mathematics, genomics, and biochemical physiology to explore mitochondrial function. His work has led to the discovery of two human disease genes that underlie fatal metabolic diseases, as well as to the unexpected finding that dysfunction in this organelle can lead to the common form of type 2 diabetes. He is currently focusing his efforts on systematically deciphering the genome’s instructions for making mitochondria. Dr. Mootha has received a number of awards, including a 2004 MacArthur Foundation Fellowship.
