Mohsin Khan, PhD

The Khan Lab combines metabolism, RNA biology, and extracellular vesicle research to understand why the adult heart repairs itself so poorly and how that capacity can be restored. The lab specializes in reintroducing developmental signaling programs, such as the miR-294 and Lin28a axis, into the injured heart to reactivate cardiomyocyte proliferation and survival. It also studies how mitochondrial proteins such as UCP2 reprogram cardiac metabolism, and how metabolites influence gene regulation and the cardiomyocyte cell cycle. The group models cardiac injury, aging, and cardiometabolic disease using cultured cardiomyocytes and mouse models of myocardial infarction, diabetic cardiomyopathy, and chronic kidney disease. Using approaches that include transcriptional profiling, metabolic and redox analyses, and extracellular vesicle and microRNA profiling, the lab works to uncover the molecular mechanisms that drive cardiac repair and failure and to identify the signals that carry information between the heart and other organs. These pathways are being targeted with the goal of developing regenerative therapies, including cell-free approaches based on exosomes.