Satdarshan (Paul) Singh Monga, MD

Dr. Monga is an Academic Physician with an interest in furthering our understanding of many aspects of liver health and disease. His lab has been focused on elucidating the cellular and molecular underpinnings of hepatic pathophysiology, especially of liver development, repair, and tumorigenesis. His research has been funded by NIH and industry since 2003. He has published 230 manuscripts and reviews in peer-reviewed journals like Hepatology, Gastroenterology, Journal of Hepatology, Cell Metabolism, Cell Reports, Cell Reports Medicine, Nature, and others. Dr. Monga has been inducted into ASCI and AAP and received other awards. Currently, he serves as the president of the American Society of Investigative Pathology. He is also the editor-in-chief for the Seminars in Liver Disease and associate/consulting editor for Science Signaling, Annual Reviews in Pathology and JCI Insights.  

Dr. Monga holds an MD from India. He did his postdoctoral fellowships in Hepatology and Molecular Biology at VA in Washington, DC from 1996-1999 and joined Pathology department at the University of Pittsburgh in 1999. He rose through the ranks and became the chief and vice chair of the division of Experimental Pathology and also served as the Assistant Dean and co-director of the Medical Scientist Training Program. In 2024, Dr. Monga was appointed as the Inaugural Director of the Organ Pathobiology and Therapeutics Institute and as Associate Dean of Research in the School of Medicine. He is currently a Professor of Pharmacology and Medicine. He is also the founding director of the Pittsburgh Liver Research Center which is funded by NIDDK as a P30 since 2019. He is also the program director of the Cellular Approaches to Tissue Engineering and Regeneration (CATER) Training Program.

His lab has used single cell, spatial and single cell spatial -omics, genetically modified mouse models, specialized models, patient tissues and specialized imaging techniques such as intravital microscopy, tissue clearing and ribbon confocal among other techniques to answer complex and clinically relevant questions in liver pathobiology. They investigated the role of Wnt-b-catenin signaling in liver development including its control of hepatocyte differentiation and maturation. They also study the role of b-catenin at cell-cell junctions in hepatocytes and cholangiocytes in controlling blood bile barrier. They study the role of Yap signaling in bile duct formation and in hepatocyte-to-cholangiocyte transdifferentiation. They also study the molecular basis of metabolic zonation in the liver and have unmasked an endothelial cell-hepatocyte nexus in this process, while other mechanisms and cell types involved in this process are being investigated. They also study the capability of liver to regenerate following partial hepatectomy or toxicant induced injury. We study complex and spatiotemporal changes in Wnt-b-catenin pathway in the process. They study the efficacy of activating b-catenin using tailored tetravalent antibody or sobiterome to induce liver repair. They also study hepatocyte-to-cholangiocyte and cholangiocyte-to-hepatocyte reprogramming as basis of repair and in cancer. We also investigate molecular subclasses of liver cancer that are driven by activating mutations in CTNNB1 which encodes b-catenin. They have identified b-catenin-active tumors to have unique metabolism that can be targeted by mTOR inhibitor which is leading to a new clinical trial at UPMC. In collaboration with Pharma, they have identified lipid nanoparticle with siRNA against b-catenin to dramatically decrease liver cancer in mice by regulating tumor immune microenvironment and tumor cell reprogramming. This has led to successful Investigational New Drug status of the therapy which is now in clinical trial for precision medicine in HCC including at UPMC (NCT06600321).