Claudio Villanueva

• Professor of Integrative Biology and Physiology, University of California, Los Angeles

Professor Villanueva completed his undergraduate training at Cal State San Bernardino where he studied hormonal regulation of sodium uptake across the abdominal epithelium. He was fascinated by the way multicellular organisms' sense and adapt to the surrounding environment. This early training sparked his interest in Integrative Physiology. As a Ph.D. student at UCSF, he trained at the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, where he studied lipid metabolism. He investigated the role of DGAT enzymes in fatty liver disease. His postdoc training was completed at UCLA, where he studied transcriptional mechanisms that regulate cellular programming of metabolism. He was recruited to the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Utah School of Medicine, and in 2019 joined the Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology at UCLA. His research aims to understand the metabolic adaptations required for cold adaptation in mammals.

Dr. Villanueva is interested in understanding how cells sense and control metabolism in response to stressors like temperature. The ability to maintain a constant body temperature despite a changing environment can lead to dramatic changes in energy expenditure. This requires an understanding of integrative metabolism and physiology. His lab will explore the molecular mechanisms that promote energy expenditure. He wants to understand how adipocytes regulate energy balance and how they communicate with the liver. These studies will provide opportunities for intervening in metabolic diseases that are associated with obesity.

• 2019–present Professor, University of California, Los Angeles

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