Calculated based on number of publications stored in Pure and citations from Scopus
1982 …2024

Research activity per year

Personal profile

Personal profile

Dr. John P. Cooke is the Chair of the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences at the Houston Methodist Research Institute, Director of the Center for Cardiovascular Regeneration, and Medical Director of the RNA Therapeutics Program in the Houston Methodist DeBakey Heart and Vascular Center in Houston, Texas.

He trained in cardiovascular medicine and obtained a Ph.D. in physiology at the Mayo Clinic. He was recruited to Harvard Medical School as an assistant professor of medicine. In 1990, he was recruited to Stanford University to spearhead the program in vascular biology and medicine, and was appointed professor in the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine, and associate director of the Stanford Cardiovascular Institute until his recruitment to Houston Methodist in 2013.

Dr. Cooke has published over 500 research papers, position papers, reviews, book chapters and patents in the arena of vascular medicine and biology with over 30,000 citations. He has served on national and international committees that deal with cardiovascular diseases, including the American Heart Association, American College of Cardiology, Society for Vascular Medicine, and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. He has served as president of the Society for Vascular Medicine, as a director of the American Board of Vascular Medicine, and as an associate editor of Vascular Medicine.

Research interests

Dr. Cooke’s research program is focused on vascular regeneration, vascular cell identity and cell fate. The program is funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health, the American Heart Association, Cancer Prevention Research Institute, and industry.

The Cooke group aims to understand the mechanisms underlying epigenetic plasticity that are required for functional adaptation to cellular challenges.  Innate immune signaling causes global changes in the expression and activity of epigenetic modifiers with metabolic coupling that favors an open chromatin configuration.  The translational output of this work is vascular regeneration via therapeutic transdifferentiation using small molecules or mRNA. In his 25 years of translational vascular biology, Dr. Cooke first described and characterized the anti-atherogenic effects of endothelium-derived nitric oxide; the anti-angiogenic effect of the NO synthase inhibitor ADMA; the angiogenic pathway mediated by endothelial nicotinic acetylcholine receptors; the role for this pathway in states of pathological angiogenesis; and developed an antagonist of the pathway that was tested in clinical trials. His clinical research group has explored the use of angiogenic agents and adult stem cells in the treatment of peripheral arterial disease. More recently, his group has generated and characterized vascular cells diferentiated from iPSCs of patients with Progeria, to understand the role of telomere erosion in this condition of accelerated aging and vascular death. His group's applicaiton of mRNA encoding human telomerase to reverse aging in this condition, and other age-related diseases, is promising.

Education/Academic qualification

Cardiovascular Medicine, Residency, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, Rochester, MN

Jan 1 1983Dec 31 1986

Award Date: Dec 31 1986

Cardiovascular Medicine, Clinical Fellowship, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, Rochester, MN

Jan 31 1983Jun 30 1985

Award Date: Jun 30 1985

Internal Medicine, Internship, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, Rochester, MN

Jun 30 1980Dec 31 1982

Award Date: Dec 31 1982

MD, Wayne State Univ. School of Medicine

Jul 1 1976Jun 15 1980

Award Date: Jun 30 1980

Physiology, PhD, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, Rochester, NY

Physiology, Research Fellowship, Mayo Graduate School of Medicine, Rochester, NY

External positions

Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine in Cardiothoracic Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College

Research Area Keywords

  • Heart & Vascular
  • Regenerative Medicine

Free-text keywords

  • Regenerative medicine
  • Stem cell
  • Vascular disease
  • Endothelium
  • Telomeres and Aging

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