Title: Transcription, Tumor Heterogeneity, and Targeted Strategies
Date: January 16, 2025 (Thursday), 9:00-11:00
Location: Zhizhen Building, Room 404 Smart Classroom, Ningbo University Health Science Center
Personal Profile: Huang Haojie
Huang Haojie is a Qiushi Chair Professor and Ph.D. supervisor at Zhejiang University. He serves as the Director of the Institute of Urological Science and Technology at the First Affiliated Hospital, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University. He was previously the Gordon H and Violet Bartels Chair Professor at the Mayo Clinic (ranked first in U.S. hospitals for consecutive years), Director of the Mayo Foundation Urology Research Center, Co-Leader of Cancer Genomics-Signaling-Metastasis Program at the Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, and Director of the Epigenetics and Functional Genomics Laboratory. He has also served as the President of the Society of Basic Urologic Research (SBUR). He has published over 170 high-quality papers in journals such as Science, Nature Medicine, Cancer Cell, Nature Cell Biology, Molecular Cell, and Science Advances, with nearly 15,000 citations and an h-index of 67. As the first inventor, he has applied for 31 US/PCT patents, with 4 granted, and two studies have entered multi-center Phase II clinical trials.
The team primarily uses research tools in molecular biology and systems biology (such as multi-omics) and diverse research models (such as organoids, PDX, GEMM, and patient specimens) to explore how genetic mutations (such as ERG gene fusion and SPOP gene mutations) promote transcription and tumor heterogeneity, including treatment resistance in tumors. Recent work includes investigating how intron polyadenylation (IPA) and long non-coding RNAs regulate the production of androgen receptor variants (AR variants) and mRNA m6A modifications, thereby affecting p53 pathway activity and hormone therapy resistance in prostate cancer. The team has also internationally developed small molecule PROTAC and oligonucleotide PROTAC (O'PROTAC) to degrade androgen receptor variants and transcription factors that are difficult to target with drugs for the first time.
