Dean Yimlamai, MD/PhD

Dr. Yimlamai is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and an Attending Pediatric Gastroenterologist at Yale University School of Medicine. Dr. Yimlamai has a long-standing interest in childhood growth and development. He worked with Dr. Julie Korenberg shortly after college, on understanding genes that lead to the physical and mental challenges in Down Syndrome and Williams Syndrome. He obtained his MD/PhD degree at Tufts University under the mentorship of Daniel G. Jay, a renowned cell biologist. With Dr Jay, Dr. Yimlamai used zebrafish to model the effects of Dscam, a key gene in Down Syndrome, demonstrating its profound effects on physical and neurologic development.

After graduation, Dr. Yimlamai completed his pediatric and specialty training at Boston Children's Hospital/Harvard Medical School. His post-doctoral studies were with Dr. Fernando Camargo, applying the findings of a recently described growth regulatory pathway, Hippo Signaling to regeneration of the liver. Dr. Yimlamai was the first to demonstrate that hepatocytes could be transformed into liver stem cells with extreme plasticity and flexibility for potential patient therapy.

Using a combination of mouse models, biochemistry, next generation sequencing and patient samples, Dr. Yimlamai continues to work toward the discovery and application of biologically relevant mechanisms that can define critical steps to change the course of liver disease.