Education

Research Interests

Nucleic acids are constantly assaulted by endogenous and exogenous agents. Interestingly, some of these agents are widely used in cancer chemotherapy, which was once thought to be solely due to their ability to cause lesions in genomic DNA. Consequently, research has predominantly focused on DNA damage repair and its influence on chemotherapy responses for decades. However, cellular RNAs are also susceptible to these chemicals and can form lesions similar to those found in DNAs. Yet, it remains unclear whether these chemically modified RNAs are toxic and how they contribute to chemotherapy responses or disease phenotypes. Given this, my research is centered on two key biological questions: 1) What are the functional effects of these chemically modified RNAs in cells, particularly on genome integrity and RNA functions? 2) What are the cellular mechanisms in response to these toxic RNA modifications? Exploring these questions will lead to novel discoveries in connecting nucleic acid damage and RNA biology, while providing new strategies for targeting RNA damage signaling to improve disease therapy.

Selected Publications