Louis C. Gerstenfeld, PhD

Professor, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine

Biography

My expertise is in the area of skeletal tissue biology. I have studied skeletal biology for more than 30 years and have broad knowledge across many areas in the field, including metabolic bone disease and orthopedic-related diseases. I have carried out numerous pre-clinical assessments of pharmacological compounds as they relate to safety and efficacy in the treatment of fracture and osteoporosis. I have expertise in skeletal tissue structure and the histomorphometric assessment of skeletal tissues, skeletal tissue cell biology and skeletal tissue transcriptomics. I was among the first four labs in the United States to develop in vitro osteoblast cultures and helped to establish the standard time dependent sequence of osteogenic differentiation in vitro. My laboratory also was one of four to initially isolate the proteins and clone the major extracellular matrix proteins of bone. I have served on the NIH IRG for Orthopedics, NASA and DOD review panels for orthopedic related research and worked on Special Emphasis Review Panels for the FDA. My current work focuses on relating genomic variants that define human bone quality to transcriptomic phenotypes of ostoeblasts and osteoclasts. Other studies in laboratory are focused on developing serum based diagnostics to follow the progression of fracture healing and define delayed and failed healing in humans.

Publications

  • Published 8/22/2025

    Nafisi N, Razavi AH, Ghiasi MS, Minassians P, Hanna P, Lechtig A, Momenzadeh K, Mahjoob A, Perez S, Keko M, Oftadeh R, Rostami MR, Vaziri A, Nazarian RM, Gerstenfeld L, Wein MN, Mirzamohammadi F, Nazarian A. Genomechanical modeling of delayed fracture healing integrating transcriptomics and tissue mechanics. Biomater Adv. 2026 Jan; 178:214468. PMID: 40865271.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 7/15/2025

    Raut RD, Choudhury C, Chakraborty AK, Singh H, Mehra P, Gerstenfeld L, Almarza A, Bais MV. The unique molecular signature of TMJ as compared to the knee, demonstrates its susceptibility to osteoarthritis. J Oral Biosci. 2025 Sep; 67(3):100680. PMID: 40812964.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 5/18/2025

    Raut RD, Choudhury C, Chakraborty AK, Singh H, Mehra P, Gerstenfeld L, Almarza A, Bais MV. Unique TMJ-specific transcriptomic signature and its medial layer: Implications in osteoarthritis. bioRxiv. 2025 May 18. PMID: 40462979.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 10/18/2024

    Jaber M, Schmidt J, Kalkhof S, Gerstenfeld L, Duda GN, Checa S. OMIBONE: Omics-driven computer model of bone regeneration for personalized treatment. Bone. 2025 Jan; 190:117288. PMID: 39426580.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 6/11/2024

    Blank K, Ekanayake D, Cooke M, Bragdon B, Hussein A, Gerstenfeld L. Relationships between matrix mineralization, oxidative metabolism, and mitochondrial structure during ATDC5 murine chondroprogenitor cell line differentiation. J Cell Physiol. 2024 Aug; 239(8):e31285. PMID: 38860464.

    Read at: PubMed

View All 220 Publications:   View Full Profile in BUMC

Other Positions

  • Research Professor, Biochemistry & Cell Biology
    Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
  • Professor, Medicine
    Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
  • Member, Center for Regenerative Medicine
    Boston University
  • Member, Evans Center for Interdisciplinary Biomedical Research
    Boston University
  • Graduate Faculty (Primary Mentor of Grad Students)
    Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, Graduate Medical Sciences

Websites

Education

  • Boston University School of Medicine, PhD
  • Pennsylvania State University, BA
  • Pennsylvania State University, BS

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