Medical Student Research Fellowship for Summer 2007

Mentor: Helen H. Hobbs
Department: Internal Medicine/Molecular Genetics
Room number: L5.134
Mail Code: 9046
Phone number: 214-648-6724
E-mail: Helen.Hobbs@UTSouthwestern.edu
Project title: Professor

Human subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable): 022007-004

Animal subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable):

Project Type (patient-based research, animal-based research, or basic research; this characterization is only to permit a general classification for grouping similar types of projects)

Brief Description of Project:

The project will focus on the genetics of hepatic steatosis. We have identified a sequence variation that is associated with increased hepatic fat, as measured noninvasively using magnetic resonance spectroscopy, in the Dallas Heart Study in three ethnic groups: Hispanics, African-Americans and Caucasians. Her project will be to determine if these sequence variations are associated with any other changes in lipid or glucose metabolism in the Dallas Heart Study. She will also determine how much these sequence variations contribute to inter-ethnic differences in hepatic fat in the general population, where hepatic steatosis is most common in Hispanics (where this allele has the highest frequency) and least common in African-Americans (where hepatic steatosis is much less frequent). This is an important question since hepatic fat is a burgeoning health problem. Moreover, it is not clear in humans the role of hepatic fat in causing insulin resistance.