Jason C. Mills MD, PhD

Jason Mills is a human pathologist with a research interest in cell and developmental biology. After completing undergraduate studies in biology and Russian at Washington University in St. Louis, he received his MD and PhD training in cell biology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, followed by a return to Wash U to do a residency in anatomic pathology at the Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, MO and postdoctoral training in bioinformatics and mouse models of gastrointestinal disease in the lab of Jeffrey I Gordon. He stayed on at Wash U as faculty, eventually becoming full professor in Medicine, Pathology, and Developmental Biology. He also served as Director of Research for the Division of Gastroenterology and Associate Director of the NIDDK funded Digestive Disease Research Cores Center (DDRCC). He recently moved his lab to Baylor College of Medicine where he holds the Brown endowed professorship in Medicine, Pathology, and Molecular & Cellular Biology, also serving as Vice Chief and Chief of Research in the Section of Gastroenterology, Co-Director of the Texas Medical Center Digestive Disease Center (an NIDDK DDRCC), as well as Associate Director of the Daniel L. Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center.

The laboratory of Dr. Mills investigates how mature, differentiated cells in the stomach arise from stem cells and how they can be recruited back into the cell cycle during tissue regeneration and in tumorigenesis. Using techniques that range from genetically modified mice to bioinformatics, his lab has identified and characterized a specific cellular-molecular program conserved across tissue types and species that mature cells can use to become regenerative, which his lab has termed ‘paligenosis’, a process that is involved in development of metaplasia and cancer. Although his work is centered in the stomach, projects in the lab also extend to paligenosis in the pancreas and esophagus, the latter especially in relation to Barrett’s metaplasia. The lab has ongoing translational efforts and roles in clinical trials focused on using paligenosis findings to better prevent or treat metaplasia and cancer. With more than 120 peer-reviewed publications and several projects that have garnered long-term NIH support, Dr. Mills is highly recognized in his field of research and was also recently inducted into American Association of Physicians.