The Rosenzweig laboratory is interested in why the heart fails. Heart failure is an enormous and growing cause of death and disability throughout the world. In addition, the heart provides a model system for studying fundamental cellular processes from cell growth and programmed death, to cell-lineage determination and regeneration.

Recently we’ve been interested in understanding how exercise protects the heart against heart failure. A variety of high throughput profiling techniques are being used to identify pathways differentially regulated in heart growth associated with exercise in comparison to the heart growth that precedes heart failure. These screens have identified interrelated transcriptional (Cell, 2010) and microRNA pathways (Cell Metabolism, 2015), which appear to mediate many of the phenotypic effects of exercise in vivo. Collaborative studies with Rich Lee’s laboratory are investigating the role of exercise in enhancing the endogenous regenerative capacity of the adult mammalian heart.