YANG LAB
We study how adult stem cells regenerate tissues throughout life
Tissue regeneration is supported by adult SCs, which exhibit
1) ability to self-renew to preserve the stem cell reservoir
2) capacity to give rise to differentiated cells
3) long-term maintenance throughout life
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The functions of adult SCs are supported by both intrinsic SC factors (e.g. transcription factors) and external signaling cues (e.g. growth factors, developmental factors) emanated from surrounding micro-environments, called niches.
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Depending on environmental cues, SCs stay in quiescence, self-renew, migrate and give rise to differentiated lineage cells.
However, due to complex crosstalk and dynamic rewiring of SC niche micro-environment, the underlying mechanisms of how SC maintenance, self-renew, fate choices and differentiation are coordinated within the cellular network still remain elusive.
To tackle this, we have the following research strategy.
We are grateful to our funders for supporting our researches.
