Director of the NextGen Precision Health building

Curators' Distinguished Professor of Nutrition & Exercise Physiology and Medicine (Gastroenterology and Hepatology), School of Medicine
Associate Dean for Basic Sciences and Research Infrastructure, School of Medicine
Research Health Scientist, Harry S Truman Memorial Veterans’ Hospital

NextGen Focus Area: Cardiovascular and Metabolic Disorders

Scott Rector is committed to growing and leading federally funded research through the NextGen Precision Health initiative, the MU School of Medicine and the Harry S. Truman Memorial Veterans' Hospital.

He was appointed associate director of the NextGen building in 2021. His active, federally funded research program focuses on prevention and treatment of chronic diseases, such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. Dr Rector's research program focuses on the mechanisms linking obesity, insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, and steatotic liver disease, with an emphasis on exercise as a strategy to improve cardiometabolic health. His laboratory also investigates liver-brain crosstalk and the role of metabolic dysfunction in neurodegenerative disease. Dr. Rector leads initiatives that advance research collaboration, innovation, and infrastructure across the University of Missouri and NextGen Precision Health.

Dr. Rector received his doctorate in exercise physiology from MU in 2007. He has co-appointments in the departments of Nutrition and Exercise Physiology and Medicine-Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the School of Medicine and also is a research health scientist at the Truman VA Hospital.

A native of Arkansas, Dr. Rector earned both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in exercise science from Arkansas State University in Jonesboro.

Precision Health Impact:

• Preventing and treating chronic diseases such as obesity and diabetes. 
• Investigating the development and progression of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. 

Publications:

• Kelty TJ, Franczak E, Gay NR, Many GM, Sagendorf TJ, Sanford JA, et al. Endurance exercise elicits temporal and sexual dimorphic multi-omics remodeling of liver metabolism revealed by MoTrPAC. Cell Rep. 2026 Jun 23;45(6):117416. doi:10.1016/j.celrep.2026.117416 PubMed PMID: 42258354; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC13383671.
• Kelty TJ, Kerr NR, Chou CH, Shryack GE, Taylor CL, Krause AA, et al. Cognitive impairment caused by compromised hepatic ketogenesis is prevented by endurance exercise. J Physiol. 2026 Mar;604(6):2491–511. doi:10.1113/JP287573 PubMed PMID: 39808588; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC12441108.
• Moore MP, Cunningham RP, Meers GM, Johnson SA, Wheeler AA, Ganga RR, et al. Compromised hepatic mitochondrial fatty acid oxidation and reduced markers of mitochondrial turnover in human NAFLD. Hepatology. 2022 Nov;76(5):1452–65. doi:10.1002/hep.32324 PubMed PMID: 35000203; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC9270503.
• Cunningham RP, Moore MP, Dashek RJ, Meers GM, Takahashi T, Sheldon RD, et al. Critical Role for Hepatocyte-Specific eNOS in NAFLD and NASH. Diabetes. 2021 Nov;70(11):2476–91. doi:10.2337/db20-1228 PubMed PMID: 34380696; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC8564406.

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Email: rectors@health.missouri.edu
Department website: https://nep.missouri.edu/faculty/scott-rector/