Our Group's fundamental research interest is to understand how does eukaryotic cell integrate various extracellular and intrinsic signals/cues to dictate cellular fate (cell proliferation, death, growth and differentiation). We focus on the interplay between cell metabolic programs and cell signaling cascades in patho-physiological contexts such germ cell development, tumorigenesis and immunes response. Notably, these are three examples that the fate change of a single cell (a germ cell, clonal expanding transformed cell and lymphocyte) will change the fate of whole organism. Our experimental models, each one of these has unique biological and technical features, include mouse model of human tumors and autoimmune disease (accessible for genetic and pharmacological modulations), frog oocytes (with defined cell cycle stage and accessible for direct intracellular injection of biological material), primary cells: MEFs, lymphocytes and macrophages (with defined genetic background and accessible genetic modulation and responsive to various patho-physiological stimulations). Our current projects include:

1. Dissect molecular and biochemical nature of metabolic checkpoint, a mechanism of transducing metabolic signals (often reflected by the change of cellular metabolites) to control cell fate (proliferation and death)
2. Decipher metabolic programs in immune cells and evaluate the impact of metabolic modulation on immunity (particularly in anti-tumor immunity)
3. Understand the mechanism and therapeutic aspects of oncogenic addiction and metabolic addiction in pediatric cancers (neuroblastma and rhabdomyosarcoma)

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