UNIverse - Public Research Portal
MALEavatar

Prof. Dr. med. Markus H. Heim

Department of Clinical Research
Profiles & Affiliations

Translational research in liver diseases

Our translational research program in hepatology is at the core of our work, supported by a comprehensive biobank of annotated liver biopsies and blood samples. These samples are analyzed with advanced technology in the Hepatology Laboratory at the Department of Biomedicine. Our current focus is on exploring host responses in chronic viral hepatitis and developing personalized medicine approaches for liver cancer patients.


In parallel, we actively engage in multiple cohort studies to deepen our understanding of liver disease. Twenty years ago, we initiated a cohort study specifically for Metabolic Dysfunction-Associated Steatotic Liver Disease (MAFLD). We also participate in Swiss and European investigator-initiated cohort studies, including the Swiss Hepatitis C Cohort Study (SCCS), the Swiss Hepatitis B Cohort Study (SHBCS), the Autoimmune Liver Diseases (AILD) Cohort Study, the European Morbus Wilson Registry, and the Hepatocellular Adenoma Registry.

Selected Publications

Ebrahimi F, Semela D, & Heim M. (2022). Impact of propofol sedation on the diagnostic accuracy of hepatic venous pressure gradient measurements in patients with cirrhosis. Hepatology International, 16(4), 817–823. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12072-021-10261-z

URLs
URLs

Ng, Charlotte K. Y., Dazert, Eva, Boldanova, Tuyana, Coto-Llerena, Mairene, Nuciforo, Sandro, Ercan, Caner, Suslov, Aleksei, Meier, Marie-Anne, Bock, Thomas, Schmidt, Alexander, Ketterer, Sylvia, Wang, Xueya, Wieland, Stefan, Matter, Matthias S., Colombi, Marco, Piscuoglio, Salvatore, Terracciano, Luigi M., Hall, Michael N., & Heim, Markus H. (2022). Integrative proteogenomic characterization of hepatocellular carcinoma across etiologies and stages. Nature Communications, 13(1), 2436. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-29960-8

URLs
URLs

Boldanova T, Fucile G, Vosshenrich J, Suslov A, Ercan C, Coto-Llerena M, Terracciano LM, Zech CJ, Boll DT, Wieland S, & Heim MH. (2021). Supervised learning based on tumor imaging and biopsy transcriptomics predicts response of hepatocellular carcinoma to transarterial chemoembolization. Cell Reports. Medicine, 2(11), 100444. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xcrm.2021.100444

URLs
URLs

Suslov A, Boldanova T, Wang X, Wieland S, & Heim MH. (2018). Hepatitis B Virus Does Not Interfere With Innate Immune Responses in the Human Liver. Gastroenterology, 154(6), 1778–1790. https://doi.org/10.1053/j.gastro.2018.01.034

URLs
URLs

Nuciforo, Sandro, Fofana, Isabel, Matter, Matthias S., Blumer, Tanja, Calabrese, Diego, Boldanova, Tujana, Piscuoglio, Salvatore, Wieland, Stefan, Ringnalda, Femke, Schwank, Gerald, Terracciano, Luigi M., Ng, Charlotte K. Y., & Heim, Markus H. (2018). Organoid Models of Human Liver Cancers Derived from Tumor Needle Biopsies. Cell reports, 24(5), 1363–1376. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2018.07.001

URLs
URLs

Selected Projects & Collaborations

Project cover

MERiC

Research Project  | 4 Project Members

Cancer is a major health problem due to the failure of current therapies to effectively eradicate the disease. Extensive research over decades has led to the development of therapies that target cancer-specific signaling pathways. However, tumors escape such therapies by activating compensatory signaling pathways, a process referred to as 'evasive resistance'. The identities of the alternative signaling pathways and functional interconnections that underlie evasive resistance remain widely unknown. Elucidating mechanisms of evasive resistance is currently the major challenge in cancer research. We will integrate cutting-edge clinical, molecular, and computational sciences in a pioneering project to understand the signaling defects that enable tumors to evade therapy. With its synergistic, interdisciplinary approach, the proposed project is, to our knowledge, unique in Europe and possibly worldwide. Within the framework of rigorously designed clinical studies, a clinician (PI: M. Heim) will provide basic research scientists with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) tissue isolated before therapy, during treatment, or at the time of tumor progression. HCC is chosen as the focal cancer based on medical importance, accessibility to repeated sampling, and ethical considerations. The tumor tissue will be obtained by needle biopsy and immediately snap frozen to preserve in vivo tumor properties. The basic research scientists (PIs: G. Christofori and M. Hall) and a computational biologist (PI: N. Beerenwinkel) will apply high- and low-throughput experimental and computational methods to determine, characterize, and model the underlying signaling defects. Importantly, using longitudinal clinical samples in combination with mouse and cellular HCC model systems, we will define treatment-related changes in cell signaling that allow tumors to circumvent therapy. This process will be iterative such that changes in treatment strategies will again be monitored in the same patient or experimental model. Insights gained will (i) reveal molecular pathomechanisms in oncogenesis, (ii) identify novel drug targets and predictive biomarkers, and (iii) lead to the rational design of personalized medicine that ultimately benefits patients by increasing therapeutic effectiveness and reducing side effects and financial burden. In aggregate, this innovative, comprehensive endeavor will elucidate mechanisms of evasive resistance and will ultimately improve cancer diagnosis, treatment and clinical outcome.