Rate My Professor Jonathan Cohen

Jonathan Cohen, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Medical School at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, where he holds the C. Vincent Prothro Distinguished Chair in Human Nutrition Research. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Cape Town in 1989 and completed postdoctoral studies at UT Southwestern, where he has remained on the faculty. His primary appointments are in the Center for Human Nutrition, the Eugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development, and the Department of Internal Medicine.

Dr. Cohen’s research focuses on the genetic determinants of plasma lipoprotein levels and the genetics of quantitative traits. In collaboration with Dr. Helen Hobbs, he has identified genes that play major roles in the metabolism of fats, cholesterol, and triglycerides. Key contributions include demonstrating that loss-of-function mutations in PCSK9 are associated with low plasma cholesterol levels and protection against coronary heart disease, as reported in a 2006 New England Journal of Medicine paper. The Hobbs-Cohen laboratory also identified the first genetic cause of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease in humans, including variants in PNPLA3 and TM6SF2. Notable publications include a 2008 Nature Genetics paper on PNPLA3 and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, a 2011 Science review on human fatty liver disease, and a 2014 Nature Genetics paper on TM6SF2. Dr. Cohen was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2022. Other honors include the Passano Award in 2016, the a. Ross Prize in 2023, and the Barbara Bowman Distinguished Texas Geneticist Award in 2015. He has held the Prothro Chair since 2004.