Professor Xuan Li

Li group is studying the basic mechanism of microtubule dysfunction in the pathogenesis of inflammatory disease, particularly inflammatory cardiovascular disease. Li’s research group revealed the regulatory machinery of microtubule function in inflammasome activation and in cardiovascular diseases. Li’s group currently focuses on deciphering the basic microtubule-dependent cellular and molecular mechanisms intertwined with innate immune response, and how the relevant regulation contributes to the development of inflammatory cardiovascular disease. Li group established and optimized a set of multidisciplinary approaches to analyse microtubule function in cardiovascular cells, particularly with a current focus on cardiomyocytes.

The heart is an exquisite machine. Cardiomyocyte is a fascinating cell type with many unresolved biology and pathology. It emerges that intracellular microtubule provides essential mechanical force in controlling cardiomyocyte contractility, and dysfunctional regulation of this machinery contributes to heart failure. Our efforts are to understand the basic microtubule biology in cardiovascular cells, to untangle the regulatory machinery in controlling microtubule function under pathology, and to accelerate the translation of our relevant basic research findings into the clinics.