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Charles C. Hong, MD, PhD

Melvin Sharoky, MD Professor of Medicine

Academic Title:

Adjunct Professor

Primary Appointment:

Medicine

Additional Title:

Co-Chief of Cardiovascular Medicine

Email:

charles.hong@som.umaryland.edu

Location:

Health Sciences Facility III, Room 7106, 670 West Baltimore Street, Baltimore, MD 21201

Phone (Primary):

410-706-2681

Education and Training

B.S. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Life Sciences

MD, PhD (Genetics), Yale University

Residency: Internal Medicine, Yale-New Haven Hospital

Fellowship: Cardiovascular Diseases, Massachusetts General Hospital

Fellowship: Chemical Biology, Harvard Medical School

Biosketch

Charles (Chaz) Hong is a physician-scientist whose research, which functions at the intersection of developmental biology, chemical biology, stem cell biology, and cardiovascular medicine, has led to new biological insights and therapeutic opportunities. Dr. Hong’s work includes innovative chemical genetic studies in zebrafish as well as the use of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) to better understand human heart diseases at the cellular level.  His clinical expertise is cardiovascular genetics.  

His scientific contributions include the discovery of the role of Phosphoinositide 3-kinases (PI3K) in vein specification during vasculogenesis, which foreshadowed the realization that aberrant PI3K activation is a common cause of clinical venous malformations.  He also discovered the first small molecule inhibitor of bone morphogenetic protein (BMP) signaling, which has led directly to a clinical stage therapeutic program for devastating human diseases. His ongoing studies include the elucidation of the novel role of centrosome reorganization in cardiac structure and function, and therapeutic targeting of a novel pro-oncogenic signaling activated downstream of the Warburg Effect.  Dr. Hong edited one of the first books focused on the role of chemical biology in stem cell and regenerative medicine, and a book covering the latest methods in chemical biology. He serves on editorial boards of number of scientific journals and is the inaugural Chief Editor of Frontiers in Drug Discovery overseeing Hematologic and Cardiovascular domains.  He is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and fellow of American Association for the Advancement of Science, and serves on the Board of the Sarnoff Foundation for Cardiovascular Research. Finally, Dr. Hong is a key member of the West Baltimore RICH (Reducing Isolation and Inequities in Cardiovascular Health) Collaborative, an interdisciplinary team of community members and healthcare providers working together to develop sustainable strategies to overcome health disparities in West Baltimore.

Prior to joining the University of Maryland School of Medicine, he was on faculty at Harvard Medical School and Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.

Lab Website: http://www.medschool.umaryland.edu/hong-lab/

Research/Clinical Keywords

General Cardiology Cardiovascular Genetics Chemical Biology Drug Discovery

Highlighted Publications

Books, Senior Editor

  • Chemical Biology: Methods and Protocols  Hempel E , Williams H, Hong C, editors. Humana Press; 2015 Jan 1.
  • Chemical Biology in Regenerative Medicine: Bridging Stem Cells and Future Therapies  Hong C, Ao A, Hao J, editors. Wiley; 2014 Aug 1.

Selected Publications

  • Chun YW, Miyamoto M, Williams CH, Neitzel LR, Silver-Isenstadt M, Liu H, Cadar AG, Fong DC, Srinivasan U, Kim S, Katagiri M, Durbin MD, Neely MD, Chen K, Feaster TK, Sheng CC, Fuller D, Finn AV, Schot R, Manciin GMS, Ess KC, Bowman AB, Han Z, Bichell DP, Su, YR, Hong CC. Impaired reorganization of centrosome structure underlies human infantile dilated cardiomyopathy. Circulation 2023; 147:1291-1303. PMID:36970983.
  • Hong CC. The grand challenge of discovering new cardiovascular drugs. Frontiers in Drug Discovery 2022; 2:1027401. PMID: 37123434.
  • Scalsky RJ, Chun Y-J, Ying Z, Perry JA*, Hong CC*. The social and natural environment’s impact on SARS-CoV-2 infection in the UK Biobank.  J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022; 19:533. PMID: 35010792. 
  • Chuang NT, Gardiner EJ, Terry DM, Crabtree J, Mahurkar AA, Rivell GL, Hong CC, Perry JA, Devine SE. Mutagenesis of human genomes by endogenous mobile elements on a population scale. Genome Research 2021; 31:2225-35. PMID: 34772701. 
  • Scalsky RJ, Chen YJ, Desai K, O’Connell JR, Perry JA*, Hong CC*. Baseline cardiometabolic profiles and SARS-CoV-2 infection in the UK Biobank. PLoS ONE 2021; 16: 30248602. PMID:33793566.
  • Cadar AG, Feaster TK, Bersell KR, Wang L, Hong TT, Balsamo JA, Zhang Z, Chun YW, Nam Y-J, Gotthardt M, Knollmann BC, Roden DM, Lim CC, Hong CC. Real-time visualization of titin dynamics reveals extensive reversible photobleaching in human induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes, AJP-Cell Physiology 2020; 318:C163-C173. PMID:31747312
  • Domanski MJ, Tian X, Wu CO, Reis JP, Day AK, Gu Y, Zhao L, Bae S, Liu K, Hassan AA, Zimrin D, Farkoh M, Hong CC, Lloyd-Jones D, Fuster V. Time Course of LDL-Cholesterol Exposure and Cardiovascular Disease Event Risk. J Am Coll Cardiol 2020; 76:1507-1516. PMID:32972526
  • Thayer T, Cardenas CL, Trejeeve M, Nicholson CH, Traeger L, Wunderer F, Slocum C, Sigurslid H, Shakartzi H, O’Rourke C, Shelton G, Buswell M, Barnes H, Neitzel LR, Ledsky C, Li P, Burke M, Farher-Eger E, Perrien DS, Kumar R, Corey K, Wells Q, Bloch KD, Hong CC, Block DB, Malhotra R. The role of bone morphogenetic protein signaling in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. Scientific Reports 2020; 10:1038. PMID:32561790
  • Durbin MD, Cadar AG, Williams CH, Bichell DP, Su YR, Hong CC. Hypoplastic left heart syndrome sequencing reveals a novel NOTCH1 mutation in a family with single ventricle defects.Pediatric Cardiology 2017; 38:1232-1240. PMID:28608148.
  • Feaster TK, Cadar AG, Wang L, Williams CH, Chun YW, Hempel J, Bloodworth N, Merryman WD, Lim CC, Wu JC, Knollmann BC, Hong CC. Matrigel Mattress: A Method for the Generation of Single Contracting Human-Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Cardiomyocytes. Circulation Research2015; 117:995-1000. PMID:26429802.
  • Owens P, Pickup MW, Novitskiy SV, Giltnane JM, Gorska AE, Hopkins CR, Hong* CC, Moses* HL. Inhibition of BMP signaling suppresses metastasis in mammary cancer.*Co-senior authors. Oncogene 2015; 34(19):2437-49. PMID:24998846.
  • Williams CH, Hempel JE, Hao J, Frist AY, Williams MM, Fleming JT, Sulikowski GA, Cooper MK, Chiang C, Hong CC. An in vivo chemical genetic screen identifies phosphodiesterase 4 as a pharmacological target for hedgehog signaling inhibition. Cell Reports 2015;11(1):43-50. PMID:25818300. PMCID:PMC4394042.
  • Hao J, Ao A, Zhou L, Murphy CK, Frist AY, Keel JJ, Thorne CA, Kim K, Lee E, Hong CC. Selective small molecule targeting β-catenin function discovered by in vivo chemical genetic screen. Cell Reports 2013;4(5):898-904. PMID:24012757. PMCID:PMC3923627.
  • Saeed O, Otsuka F, Polavarapu R, Karmali V, Weiss D, Davis T, Rostad B, Pachura K, Adams L, Elliott J, Taylor WR, Narula J, Kolodgie F, Virmani R, Hong CC, Finn AV. Pharmacological suppression of hepcidin increases macrophage cholesterol efflux and reduces foam cell formation and atherosclerosis. Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology 2012; 32(2):299-307. PMID:22095982. PMCID:PMC3262074.
  • Wang H, Hao J, Hong CC. Cardiac induction of embryonic stem cells by a small molecule inhibitor of Wnt/β-catenin signaling. ACS Chemical Biology 2011; 6(2):192-7. PMID:21077691. PMCID:PMC3076310.
  • Wiley DM, Kim JD, Hao J, Hong CC, Bautch VL, Jin SW. Distinct signalling pathways regulate sprouting angiogenesis from the dorsal aorta and the axial vein. Nature Cell Biology 2011;13(6):686-92. PMID:21572418. PMCID:PMC3107371.
  • Hao J, Ho JN, Lewis JA, Karim KA, Daniels RN, Gentry PR, Hopkins CR, Lindsley CW, Hong CC. In vivo structure-activity relationship study of dorsomorphin analogs identifies selective VEGF and BMP inhibitors. ACS Chemical Biology 2010;5(2):245-53. PMID:20020776. PMCID:PMC2825290.
  • Yu PB, Deng DY, Lai CS, Hong CC, Cuny GD, Bouxsein ML, Hong DW, McManus PM, Katagiri T, Sachidanandan C, Kamiya N, Fukuda T, Mishina Y, Peterson RT, Bloch KD. BMP type I receptor inhibition reduces heterotopic [corrected] ossification. Nature Medicine 2008; 14(12):1363-9. PMID:19029982. PMCID:PMC2846458.
  • Yu PB, Hong CC, Sachidanandan C, Babitt JL, Deng DY, Hoyng SA, Lin HY, Bloch KD, Peterson RT. Dorsomorphin inhibits BMP signals required for embryogenesis and iron metabolism. Nature Chemical Biology 2008;4(1):33-41. PMID: 18026094. PMCID:PMC2727650.
  • Hong CC, Peterson QP, Hong J-Y, Peterson RT.  Artery/vein specification is governed by opposing phosphatidylinositol-3 kinase and MAP kinase/ERK signaling.  Current Biology 2006; 16:1366-1372. PMID:16824925. PMCID:PMC1930149.
  • Hong CC, Hashimoto C.  An unusual mosaic protein with a protease domain, encoded by the nudel gene, is involved in defining embryonic dorsoventral polarity in Drosophila.Cell 1995; 82:785-794. PMID:7671306.

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