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Research Assistant Professor

Division of Renal Diseases and Hypertension, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

Junior faculty appointment.

• Focus: Function of perivascular progenitor cells in cardiovascular inflammation and fibrosis
• Key technical achievement: Bioinformatics analysis of scRNA-seq and spatial transcriptomics data focusing on differential expression, enrichment, trajectory and cell-cell communication analysis and visualization using scverse packages.

Instructor

Division of Renal Diseases and Hypertension, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

Junior faculty appointment.

• Focus: Metabolic reprogramming of vascular smooth muscle cells in injury
• Key technical achievement: Assembly of unbiased immunofluorescent image analysis workflow using Cellpose, FIJI, and Python.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Division of Renal Diseases and Hypertension, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

Postdoctoral training in Dr. Weiser-Evans Laboratory.

• Focus: Function of vascular smooth muscle cells and progenitor cells in vascular remodeling
• Key technical achievement: Quantitative imaging analysis of fibrosis

Certificate

University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, US

Personalized and Genomic Medicine

Ph.D.

University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, US

Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

M.D.

Medical College of Qingdao University, Qingdao, China

Medicine

Graduate Studies Fellowship Scholarship

University of Nebraska Medical Center

The award supported the research of iron homeostasis in metabolic syndrome.

Postdoctoral Fellowship Award

American Heart Association

The three year funding was awarded to support the investigation of the protective role of PTEN against pathological vascular fibrosis and remodeling

ATVB Travel Award for Young Investigators

American Heart Association

The award supported the travel and expense to attend Vascular Discovery 2019.

Travel Award

UCD Postdoctoral Association

The award supported expense to attend Advanced Single Cell RNA-Seq Workshop at UC Davis.

Smooth muscle–derived progenitor cell myofibroblast differentiation through KLF4 downregulation promotes arterial remodeling and fibrosis

JCI Insight. 2020 Dec 3;5(23):e139445

Identified and characterized a novel smooth muscle-derived vascular progenitor cell population (AdvSca1-SM), demonstrating its role in adventitial remodeling through lineage tracing and RNA-seq.

PTEN (Phosphatase and Tensin Homolog) Protects Against Ang II (Angiotensin II)-Induced Pathological Vascular Fibrosis and Remodeling-Brief Report

Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol. 2020 Feb;40(2):394-403.

Systemic PTEN elevation mediates protection against Ang II-induced vascular inflammation and fibrosis predominantly through effects in resident vascular cells.

Saturated Fatty Acids Induce Post-transcriptional Regulation of HAMP mRNA via AU-rich Element-binding Protein, Human Antigen R (HuR)

J. Biol. Chem. 2015 Oct 2;290(40):24178-89

lipids mediate post-transcriptional regulation of HAMP throughPKC- and HuR-dependent mechanisms.

A novel link between lipid and iron metabolism.

In my dissertation work, I characterized molecular mechanisms for the induction of hepcidin expression by two lipid species. Specifically, saturated fatty acids induce hepcidin expression by activating the nucleo-cytosolic shuttling of Human Antigen R (HuR), which stabilizes hepcidin mRNA through direct interaction with the AU-rich element in its 3’UTR. In addition, I have discovered that ceramide, a lipid intermediate, activates inflammatory signaling pathway, JAK/STAT3, and STAT3 directly interacts with its response element in the hepcidin promoter, therefore activates transcription.

• Lipid metabolism
• Iron metabolism
• Hepcidin

Protective effect of PTEN elevation against pathological vascular fibrosis and remodeling.

We investigated the mechanisms of how genetic and pharmacological up-regulation of Pten gene protect against vascular fibrosis and remodeling.

• Pten
• Vascular remodeling
• Vascular inflammation
• Smooth muscle cells

Smooth muscle cell-derived vascular progenitor cells promote cardiovascular remodeling and fibrosis through loss of Klf4 activity and spontaneous differentiation into myofibroblasts.

We used lineage tracing mouse models, combined with RNA-seq, scRNA-seq technologies to examine the function of vascular progenitor cells in cardiovascular remodeling

• AdvSca1 cells
• Vascular remodeling
• RNA-seq
• Progenitor cells