Area of research
Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism · Oncology
Research interest
Research topics from publications: Matrix stiffness exacerbates the proinflammatory responses of vascular smooth muscle cell through the DDR1-DNMT1 mechanotransduction axis; Echinatin maintains glutathione homeostasis in vascular smooth muscle cells to protect against matrix remodeling and arterial stiffening. Representative work: Vascular smooth muscle cell (vSMC) is highly plastic as its phenotype can change in response to mechanical cues inherent to the extracellular matrix (ECM). VSMC may be activated from its quiescent contractile phenotype to a proinflammatory phenotype, whereby the cell secretes chemotactic and inflammatory cytokines, e.g. MCP1 and IL6, to functionally regulate monocyte and macrophage infiltration during the development of various vascular diseases including arteriosclerosis. Here, by culturing vSMCs on polyacrylamide (PA) substrates with variable elastic moduli, we discovered a role of discoidin domain receptor 1 (DDR1), a receptor tyrosine kinase that binds collagens, in mediating the mechani