CENTER FOR MOLECULAR AND TRANSLATIONAL MEDICINE
The Center for Molecular and Translational Medicine is designed to convert significant research findings into diagnostic tools and medicines that will improve health and help millions of people suffering from heart disease, diabetes and other illnesses.
Ming-Hui Zou is a Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar in Molecular Medicine and the founding director of the Center for Molecular and Translational Medicine. Zou studies the role of oxidative stress in cardiovascular biology and diseases. He is recognized for making influential discoveries in cardiovascular research, including identifying the role of two key proteins involved in the vessel pathology that leads to vascular diseases and characterizing the AMP-activated kinase, a key enzyme in the regulation of metabolism, obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases.
The Center for Molecular and Translational Medicine is focused on cardiovascular remodeling in obesity and obesity-related diseases, including diabetes, hypertension, heart diseases and stroke, with emphasis on the regulation of these processes.
Using a multidisciplinary approach, its scientists employ physical, chemical, biological and medical techniques to describe molecular structures and mechanisms, identify fundamental molecular and genetic errors of disease and develop molecular interventions to correct them. In addition to contributing to a fundamental understanding of these systems, the studies have clinical relevance to obesity and obesity-related cardiovascular diseases.