The majority of human diseases involve complex interactions of different organ and cellular systems. Traditional organ-centric pathophysiological models fail to capture these interactions. We are an interdisciplinary international team of researchers striving to develop new therapies for GI diseases by decoding molecular circuits of organ crosstalk.
We conduct research on the gut-liver axis in liver diseases, including non-alcoholic fatty liver, acute liver failure, and cholestatic liver diseases. Moreover, we study how neuro-immune communication in the GI tract controls complex processes such as inflammation and carcinogenesis by dissecting crosstalk between different cellular systems using state-of-the-art imaging and quantitative multi-omics technologies. Our research includes work in animal models as well as clinical applications to translate our findings from bench to bedside. We apply a wide range of technologies in our research, including flow cytometry, single-cell RNA sequencing, shotgun metagenomic sequencing, metabolomic analyses, analyses of large patient cohorts (UK Biobank, Penn Medicine Biobank), and artificial intelligence.
By studying GI diseases from the angle of organ and cellular crosstalk, we aim to identify novel principles of disease and therapeutic targets. Following this mission, our lab fosters close collaboration with various research groups within Dresden University of Technology (TU Dresden) and with our national and international collaborators.
Check our recent publications or reach out to learn more about our research!