Neuro-Immune-Vascular Group
Principal investigator
Name:
Jia LiAssistant Professor , PhD, Assistant Professor
Position:
Affiliation:
School of Life Science and Technology
Honor:
Education Background:
- 2003/09-2007/07, Northwest University, Bachelor
- 2007/09-2013/06, Institute of Health Sciences, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, CAS., Ph.D.
Working Experience:
- 2013/07-2016/02, Institute of Neuroscience, CAS, Postdoc Fellow
- 2016/02-2016/12, School of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Postdoc Fellow
- 2017/02-2019/06, School of Medicine, University of California, San Digeo, Postdoc Fellow
- 2019/07-2025/07, Institute of Neuroscience, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, CAS, Associated Investigator
- 2025/07-Now, ShanghaiTech University, School of Life Science and Technology, Assistant Professor (TENURE-TRACK)
Group Introduction
Research Area:
Brain vascular and brain lymphatic development and disease
Research Interests:
I. Neurovascular Development and Regeneration Neural regulation of cerebrovascular network patterning. Neurogenic control of vascular specialization (e.g., pericytes, blood-brain barrier). Neural mechanisms driving post-injury vascular regeneration. Goal: Decipher neural activity-dependent encoding of vascular 3D architecture for cerebrovascular disease therapy.
II. Meningeal Lymphatic Development and Neural Regulation Developmental origin and differentiation of meningeal lymphatic endothelial cells. Neural control of lymphatic morphogenesis and regeneration. Lymphatic dysfunction in neurodegenerative pathologies. Goal: Establish neural activity → glia → lymphatic development axis to elucidate neuro-immune interactions.
III. Frontier Technology Development
Innovative Gene Editing: Precise DNA/RNA/protein manipulation. 3D Genomic Imaging: Spatiotemporal tracking of gene loci dynamics. Enhancer Screening: ATAC-seq-based identification of neurovascular regulatory elements. Single-Molecule RNA Tracking: Long-term in vivo RNA visualization. Secretory Protein Gradient Mapping: Real-time tracing of key factors (e.g., VEGF). Cell-Cell Interaction Tracing: Live monitoring of intercellular contacts and lineage fate. Cell Proliferation Kinetics: In vivo quantification of mitotic events.
Research Achievement
1. Neural Activity Regulates Meningeal Lymphatic Development via Specialized Glia (Cell, 2025) Novel neuro-lymphatic regulatory mechanism: Serendipitously discovered that meningeal mural lymphatic endothelial cells (muLECs) are developmentally modulated by neural activity. Key cellular pathway: Identified slc6a11b+ radial astrocytes extending processes to contact the leptomeninges, which control muLEC development via neural activity-dependent Vegfc expression. Cross-tissue collaboration: Astrocytes cooperate with ccbe1+ fibroblasts to restrict lymphatic endothelial cell growth exclusively to the brain surface.
Significance: First demonstration of brain-directed immune system development, establishing a new paradigm for neuroimmune research.
2. Cerebrovascular Development and Disease (Cell Rep 2024, Cardiovasc Res 2024, JGG 2024) Hemodynamic regulatory axis for the blood-brain barrier (BBB): Blood-flow shear stress activates endothelial mechanosensor Piezo1, triggering Notch signaling to regulate brain pericyte proliferation (Cell Rep 2024; JGG 2024). Mechanism of intracranial aneurysm: Single-cell sequencing of human surgical samples revealed angiogenesis pathway activation and aberrant ANGPT2 expression. In vivo modeling confirmed that ANGPT2 inhibition ameliorates vascular dilation (Cardiovasc Res 2024).
3. Advanced Genome Editing Technologies (Cell Res 2015, STAR Protoc 2024, Sci China Life Sci 2020) Intron-targeted knock-in strategy: Achieves precise, non-disruptive integration of exogenous sequences while preserving endogenous gene regulation (Cell Res 2015; STAR Protoc 2024). Conditional gene-editing system (zCKOIS): Enables one-step assembly of knockout-knockin-fluorescent reporter multifunctional zebrafish models (Sci China Life Sci 2020).
Representative Publications (*First Author, # Corresponding Author)
- 1. Li, Jia*#; Liu, Mingjian*; Du, Wenjie*; Peng, Xiaolan; Deng, Hao; Zi, Huaxing; Shang, Hanbing#; Du, Jiulin#. Neural-activity-regulated and glia-mediated control of brain lymphatic development. Cell. 30 Apr 2025.
- 2. Zi, Huaxing*; Peng, Xiaolan; Cao, Jianbin; Xie, Tianyi; Liu, Tingting; Li, Hongyu; Bu, Jiwen; Du, Jiulin#; Li, Jia#. Piezo1-dependent regulation of pericyte proliferation by blood flow during brain vascular development. Cell Reports. 3 Jan 2024.
- 3. Zi, Huaxing*; Peng, Xiaolan*; Sun, Le; Li, Hongyu; Shen, Xiulian; Chen, Minjia; Deng, Qiusui; Hua, Ye; Du, Jiulin#; Li, Jia#. Foxc1b regulates brain pericyte proliferation in zebrafish larvae. Journal of Genetics and Genomics. 12 Sep 2024.
- 4. Zi, Huaxing*; Peng, Xiaolan*; Du, Jiulin#; Li, Jia#. Protocol for generating a pericyte reporter zebrafish line Ki(pdgfrb-P2A-GAL4-VP16) using a CRISPR-Cas9-mediated knockin technique. STAR Protocols. 13 Dec 2024.
- 5. Yu, Guo*; Li, Jia*; Zhang, Hongfei*; Zi, Huaxing; Liu, Mingjian; An, Qingzhu; Qiu, Tianming; Li, Peiliang; Song, Jianping; Liu, Peixi; Quan, Kai; Li, Sichen; Liu, Yingjun; Zhu, Wei#; Du, Jiulin#. Single-cell analysis reveals the implication of vascular endothelial cell-intrinsic ANGPT2 in human intracranial aneurysm. Cardiovascular Research. 24 Aug 2024.
- 6. Liang, Jinxiu*; Jiang, Peijun; Yan, Shuanfang; Cheng, Tao; Chen, Shuo; Xian, Kexin; Xu, Pengfei; Xiong, Jingwei; He, Aibin; Li, Jia#; Han, Peidong#. Genetically encoded tension heterogeneity sculpts cardiac trabeculation. Science Advances. 7 May 2025.
- 7. Gu, Shanye*#; Li, Jia*; Li, Siyuan*; Cao, Jianbin; Bu, Jiwen; Ren, Yonggang; Du, Wenjie; Chen, Zhecong; Xu, Chufan; Wang, Mingcang; Jiang, Lai; Huang, Cheng; Du, Jiulin#.Efficient replacement of long DNA fragments via non-homologous end joining at non-coding regions.Journal of Molecular Cell Biology. 10 Apr 2021.
- 8. Li, Jia*#; Li, Hongyu*; Gu, Shanye*; Zi, Huaxing; Jiang, Lai; Du, Jiulin#. One-step generation of zebrafish carrying a conditional knockout-knockin visible switch via CRISPR/Cas9-mediated intron targeting. Science China Life Sciences . 20 Dec 2019.
- 9. Li, Jia*; Zhang, Baibing*; Ren, Yonggang; Gu, Shanye; Xiang, Yuanhang; Du, Jiulin#. Intron targeting-mediated and endogenous gene integrity-maintaining knockin in zebrafish using the CRISPR/Cas9 system. Cell Research. 7 Apr 2015.
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