Dr. McConnell graduated from Amherst College with a B.A. in Chemistry and received his MD from Weill Cornell Medical College. He subsequently did his residency in Internal Medicine at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and gastroenterology fellowship at Yale-New Haven Hospital, where he trained as a T32 fellow in the lab of Yasuko Iwakiri. He is currently an assitant professor at Yale where his research focuses on the role of platelets in liver disease. Platelets have been implicated in the pathogenesis of steatotic, cholestatic, and toxin-mediated liver diseases, but the mechanisms by which they affect the progression of these diseases remain poorly defined.  His lab studies changes in platelet RNA and protein content in disease conditions that promote worsening liver pathology through communication between platelets and cells in the liver sinusoid. Because of the known effects of alcohol on the bone marrow, he is currently focusing on defining the phenotype of platelets in alcohol-associated hepatitis and alcohol-associated cirrhosis, and subsequently defining the mechanisms by which they signal to liver cells such as liver sinusoidal endothelial cells and Kupffer cells to promote inflammation and fibrosis.