Diego Grinman, PhD

Dr. Diego Grinman is a Postdoctoral Associate at the Department of Internal Medicine, Section of Endocrinology & Metabolism. His long term research interests focus on the alterations of energy metabolism caused by breast tumors. His academic training at the University of Buenos Aires focused on mammary gland physiology, as well as lipid and energy metabolism adaptations during lactation. First, as an undergraduate student in Dr. Adali Pecci’s laboratory at the University of Buenos Aires, Dr. Grinman investigated a signaling pathway that prevents mammary epithelium cell death. As a graduate student, he focused on the processes by which the mammary gland regulates the lipid composition of milk and he described the Liver X Receptor (LXR) as a key regulator of cholesterol transport into milk during lactation. During his first postdoctoral appointment at Dr. Edith Kordon laboratory in the Institute for Physiology, Molecular Biology and Neurosciences (IFIBYNE), he investigated the factors that regulate mammary gland involution after weaning. Currently, as a postdoctoral associate at Dr. Wysolmerski’s laboratory, he is studying the role of the calciotropic parathyroid hormone-related protein (PTHrP) in tumor growth as well as in the development of cancer anorexia cachexia syndrome (CACS) in a model of breast cancer. CACS is a wasting syndrome characterized by weight loss, anorexia, asthenia and anemia, and an important contributor to mortality in breast cancer patients. His goal is to build on his previous training in mammary gland and energy metabolism by moving into a breast cancer model to study the link between this type of cancer and alterations of energy homeostasis to investigate those effects in a clinically relevant setting in vivo.