Alec A. Schmaier, MD, PhD

Harvard Medical School
Division of Cardiovascular Medicine
Division of Hemostasis and Thrombosis
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

3 Blackfan Circle, Room 909, Boston MA 02215
Tel: 617-735-2574
aschmaie@bidmc.harvard.edu

Bio

Alec A. Schmaier is a cardiologist, vascular medicine specialist, and physician-scientist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School. He completed medical school at the University of Pennsylvania and performed his PhD in the laboratory of Dr. Mark Kahn where he discovered a novel regulator of collagen-induced platelet activation and identified unique aspects of the evolution of cellular hemostasis from birds to mammals. Dr. Schmaier completed Internal Medical residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and Cardiology and Vascular Medicine fellowships at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He performed post-doctoral research in the laboratories of Drs. Samir Parikh and Robert Flaumenhaft at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

Research

Dr. Schmaier’s laboratory studies how endothelial dysfunction predisposes to blood clotting. Endothelial cells normally maintain an anticoagulant surface under healthy conditions. During inflammation, infection, or other disease states, endothelial cells undergo a transformation to promote thrombosis. Our research focuses on how the endothelial cell membrane promotes blood clotting through negatively charged phospholipids on the cell surface. We are characterizing regulators of “phospholipid scrambling” that operate in endothelial cells and promote thrombosis, and studying drugs that inhibit this process. We also investigate mechanisms of endothelial cell dysfunction in COVID-19 that contribute to microvascular disease. Using animal models, patient samples, cell culture, and biochemical techniques, current projects aim at understanding how phospholipid scrambling contributes to thrombosis and how it may be targeting with novel drugs to treat cardiovascular disease.