University of California-Los Angeles · GeneticsPajukanta Lab
Paivi Pajukanta · Los Angeles, California
Research Focus
Dr. Paivi Pajukanta's lab at UCLA focuses on understanding how obesity affects health, particularly in regards to cardiometabolic diseases like diabetes and liver disease. The lab conducts cutting-edge research using advanced techniques like single-cell RNA sequencing to uncover the genetic and environmental factors that influence these diseases. Their ultimate goal is to identify ways to prevent or delay the onset of these diseases, especially considering the differences between sexes in disease predisposition.
cardiometabolic diseasesobesitygene-environment interactionsgene-sex interactionsepigeneticstranscriptional markerssingle-cell RNA sequencingadipose tissuehealth-to-disease transitionsfunctional genomics
Research Aims
5AIM 01Identify transcriptional and epigenetic markers for health-to-cardiometabolic disease transitions.
AIM 02Discover gene-environment interactions impacting cardiometabolic disease outcomes.
AIM 03Investigate sex-specific differences in genetic predisposition to cardiometabolic disorders.
AIM 04Characterize cell-type specific gene expression in adipose tissue.
AIM 05Identify candidate genetic variants linked to cardiometabolic diseases in diverse populations.
Skills the Lab Values
single-cell RNA sequencingbulk RNA sequencingATAC-seqCRISPRsiRNAdata analysisepigenomicsbiostatisticssample collection from human tissuesvariant-to-gene linkage analysis
Output against the department
Publications255top 32% of dept.82nd of 259
this lab
most publishedleast published
Citations14ktop 40% of dept.103rd of 259
this lab
most citedleast cited
Career totals from OpenAlex, compared against labs that share a department. A department spans everything from one paper to tens of thousands, so bar heights are on a log scale — otherwise the largest lab would flatten every other bar to a line.