Alison Kohan, PhD, FAHA, is a tenured Associate Professor of Medicine in the Department of Medicine, Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism, at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. The long-term goals of her laboratory are to understand: (1) dietary lipid absorption and chylomicron synthesis and (2) the influence of chylomicrons in metabolic and inflammatory disease.
To test physiologic and disease processes that arise from the small intestine, her lab has developed unique model systems and uses cellular metabolism approaches. The Kohan lab was the first lab to engineer the primary intestinal organoid culture system for studies of dietary lipid absorption [J Lipid Res 2017; J Lipid Res 2019]. Recently, her lab pioneered a unique 1-day mouse lymph cannulation model that enables the collection of flowing mesenteric lymph from live mice for 6 hours after a duodenal nutrient infusion [J Vis Exp 2022; J Lipid Res 2022]. This makes the Kohan lab one of the only in the world to collect post-prandial lymph in >50ul quantities. The lab has now extended this mouse surgical model to include a quadruple cannulation, with cannulas in the duodenum, jugular vein, portal vein, and mesenteric lymph duct, which has only ever been accomplished in rats, dogs, and pigs, and never with serial collections over the 6-h post-absorptive period.
Using these unique models, the Kohan lab has made several discoveries. Her group has shown that apolipoprotein (apo) C-III, a significant cardiovascular risk factor, regulates intracellular lipid metabolism in enterocytes [J Lipid Res 2019], inhibits chylomicron secretion into the mesenteric lymphatics [Physiol Rep 2014], and is involved in aortic valve calcification [J Biol Chem 2021]. She has also discovered that chylomicrons shift Treg apoptosis, lipid uptake, and accumulation [BioRxiv 2019; Nat Comms 2022]. Most recently, Kohan used her cellular metabolism approaches to identify a new role for CFTR in the regulation of fatty acid transport and chylomicron synthesis in the small intestine [J Lipid Res, 2024]. Kohan is also the Director of the Lipid Analytics Core in the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism.
Major questions in the Kohan Lab:
- How do Foxp3+Tregs choose between lipoprotein triglyceride and plasma free fatty acids for fuel and does this metabolic flexibility change Treg function, proliferation, or maintenance of Foxp3?
- What is the role of dysfunctional chylomicrons in Cystic Fibrosis metabolic disease, and how does modulator therapy (Trikafta®) impact chylomicron metabolism?
- What are the mechanisms of lymph versus portal partitioning during the absorption the nutrients, and is this regulated in health and disease?
- BS, Molecular and Cellular Biology, University of Arizona (Tucson), 2000
- MS, Science Education, West Virginia University, 2003
- PhD, Biochemistry, West Virginia University, 2009
- Postdoctoral Fellowship, Lipid and Lipoprotein Metabolism, University of Cincinnati, 2014
Education & Training
Teng L, Dedousis N, Adeshirlarijaney A, Kanshana JS, Liu M, Hodges CA, Kohan AB. Impaired intestinal free fatty acid transport and chylomicron formation, not defective luminal triglyceride hydrolysis, causes metabolic defects in cystic fibrosis. J Lipid Res. 2024 Jul;65(7):100551. PMID: 39002195.
Li D, Rodia C, Tambini N, Kohan AB. Basolateral triglyceride-rich lipoprotein uptake is linked to chylomicron secretion in enterocytes and is regulated by apoC-III. J Lipid Res. 2019 Sep;60(9):1503-1515. PMID: 31152000.
Jattan J, Rodia C, Li D, Diakhate A, Dong H, Bataille A, Shroyer NF, Kohan AB. Using primary murine intestinal enteroids to study dietary TAG absorption, lipoprotein synthesis, and the role of apoC-III in the intestine. J Lipid Res. 2017 May;58(5):853-865. PMCID: PMC5408603
Dedousis N, Teng L, Kanshana JS, Kohan AB. A single-day mouse mesenteric lymph surgery in mice: an updated approach to study dietary lipid absorption, chylomicron secretion, and lymphocyte dynamics. J Lipid Res. 2022 Sep 21:100284. PMID: 36152881.
Bazioti V, La Rose AM, Maassen S, Bianchi F, de Boer R, Guilbaud E, Flohr-Svendsen A, Groenen AG, Garza AM, Koster M, Kloosterhuis NJ, Pranger A, Langelaar-Makkinje, de Bruin A,6, van de Sluis B, Kohan AB, Yvan-Charvet L, van den Bogaart G, and Westerterp M. T-cell Abca1 and Abcg1 cholesterol efflux pathways suppress T-cell apoptosis and senescence and increase atherosclerosis in middle-aged Ldlr-/- mice. Nat Commun. 2022 Jul 1;13(1):3799. PMCID: PMC9249754
- Ascending Star Award, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, 2025
- Fellow of the American Heart Association (FAHA), 2023
- 47th Wendell Griffith Lecturer, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Saint Louis University, MO, 2020
- Irving Page Early Career Award Finalist, ATVB, Boston MA, 2019
- Award for Outstanding Mentorship, McNair Scholars Program, University of Connecticut, 2016
R01 DK143623, Deciphering the role of CFTR in dietary fatty acid transport in the small intestine, PI, 2025-2030.
R01 DK140931, Impact of a Glucagon-Like Peptide-1 Receptor Agonist administration on SIV/HIV pathogenesis and ART, MPI, 2025-2030.
