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Professor
Laboratory of RNA Splicing and Diseases
Dept. of Biochemistry
College of Life Sciences
Wuhan University
Wuhan 430072, China
Laboratory: Room 1130, Building of College of Life Sciences
Tel: 027-68789348 (office); 027-68789349 (lab)
E-mail: Yongzhen.Xu@whu.edu.cn
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Research Interests:
RNA splicing, removal of introns, is an essential step during eukaryotic RNA processing, and is critical for regulation of gene expression. RNA splicing is catalyzed by the spliceosome, a large and dynamic macromolecular machine that consists of five snRNAs and more than 150 proteins. Both fidelity and efficiency of RNA splicing are important for generating accurate mRNAs, and thereby functional proteins. The dynamic nature of spliceosome assembly and catalysis provide many opportunities for proofreading. Furthermore, regulation of multiple styles of intron selection, including alternative splicing, trans-splicing, back splicing and minor splicing, are critical for differentiation, development and diseases. Ongoing projects in this laboratory include:
1) Mechanism of intron selection in alternative splicing, trans-splicing, back splicing and minor splicing;
2) Regulation of RNA splicing related Drosophila development and human diseases;
3) Splicing proofreading and co-transcriptional splicing;
4) Highly conserved intronic sequences and their functions.
Education:
B.S. (Agriculture): Anhui Agricultural University, 1989-1993
M.S. (Agriculture): Anhui Agricultural University, 1993-1996
Ph.D. (Biochemistry & Molecular Biology): Shanghai Inst. of Biochemistry, CAS, 1996-1999
Research Experience:
Research Associate: Shanghai Inst. of Biochemistry, CAS, 1999-2000
Postdoctoral Fellow and Research Associate: Albert Einstein College of Medicine, 2000-2008
Principle Investigator & Professor: SIPPE, SIBS, CAS, 2008-2018
Professor: College of Life Science, Wuhan University 2018- present
Academic Awards:
Outstanding Postdoctoral Research Scholar Prize, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, 2007
Hundred Talents, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 2008
Pujiang Talents, Shanghai City, 2009
National Funds for Distinguished Young Scientists, NSFC, 2015
Selected Publications:
1) Qiu C, Zhang Y, Fan YJ, Pang TL, Su Y, Zhan S*, Xu YZ* (2018). HITS-CLIP reveals sex-differential RNA binding and alterative splicing regulation of SRm160 in Drosophila. Journal of Molecular Cell Biology, in press.
2) Tang Q, Rodriguez-Santiago S, Wang J, Pu J, Yuste A, Gupta V, Moldón A, Xu YZ*, Query CC* (2016). SF3B1/Hsh155 HEAT motif mutations affect interaction with the spliceosomal ATPase Prp5, resulting in altered branch site selectivity in pre-mRNA splicing. Genes & Development 30(24): 2710-2723.
3) Gao JL, Fan YJ, Wang XY, Zhang Y, Pu J, Li L, Shao W, Zhan S, Hao J, Xu YZ* (2015). A conserved intronic U1 snRNP-binding sequence promotes trans-splicing in Drosophila. Genes & Development 29(7): 760-771.
4) Qiu C, Liu WY*, Xu YZ* (2015). Fluorescence labeling of short RNA by oxidation at the 3'-end. Methods in Molecular Biology 1297: 113-120.
5) Wang XY, Zheng ZZ, Song HS, Xu YZ* (2014). Conserved RNA cis-elements regulate alternative splicing of Lepidopteran doublesex. Insect Biochemistry and Molecular Biology 44(1), 1-11.
6) Zhang ZM, Yang F, Zhang J, Tang Q, Li J, Gu J, Zhou J*, Xu YZ* (2013). Crystal structure of Prp5p reveals interdomain interactions that impact spliceosome assembly. Cell Reports 5, 1269-1278.
7) Yang F, Wang XY, Zhang ZM, Pu J, Fan YJ, Zhou J, Query CC, Xu YZ* (2013). Splicing proofreading at 5' splice sites by ATPase Prp28p. Nucleic Acids Research 41(8), 4660-4670.
8) Shao W, Zhao QY, Wang XY, Xu XY, Li MW, Li X* and Xu YZ* (2012). Alternative splicing and trans-splicing events revealed by analysis of the Bombyx mori transcriptome. RNA 18(7), 1395-1407.
9) Shao W, Kim HS, Cao Y, Xu YZ*, Query CC* (2012). A U1–U2 snRNP interaction network during intron definition. Molecular and Cellular Biology 32(2), 470-478.
10) Xu YZ and Query CC (2007). Competition between the ATPase Prp5 and branch region-U2 snRNA pairing modulates the fidelity of spliceosome assembly. Molecular Cell 28(5), 838-849.
11) Xu YZ, Newnham CM, Kameoka S, Huang T, Konarska MM and Query CC (2004). Prp5 bridges U1 and U2 snRNPs and enables stable U2 snRNP association with intron RNA. The EMBO Journal 23(2), 376-385.
