Blood & Immune Cell Regeneration

Dr. Wang’s Group has recently developed a de novo method of generating functional T cells (2018, Nature Immunology). They discovered that a transcription factor Hoxb5, which is expressed in uncommitted hematopoietic progenitor cells but absent in committed mature blood lineages, was able to reprogram pro-pre-B cells into functional early thymus progenitors. Mechanistically, the Hoxb5 repressed B cell ‘master genes’, activated T cell regulators and regulated crucial chromatin modifiers in pro-pre-B cells and ultimately drove the B cell fate–to–T cell fate conversion in vivo. This study uncovers a new paradigm for generating functional T cells via reprogramming in vivo, which provides an alternative T cell source for translational researches.

2. Xuejia Li, Chengxiang Xia, Tongjie Wang,……, Juan Du*, Jinyong Wang*. Pyrimidoindole derivative UM171 enhances derivation of hematopoietic progenitor cells from human pluripotent stem cells. Stem Cell Research.2017 Mar; 21:32-39

3. Tongjie Wang, Chen Li,……, Jinyong Wang*. Oncogenic NRAS hyper-activates multiple pathways in human cord blood stem/progenitor cells and promotes myelomonocytic proliferation in vivo. American Journal of Translational Research.2015 Oct ;7(10):1963-1973

4. Xiaoli Chen, Qianhao Zhao,……, Jinyong Wang*. OP9-Lhx2 stromal cells facilitate derivation of hematopoietic progenitors both in vitro and in vivo. Stem Cell Research. 2015 Sep;15(2):395-402

5. Dan Yang, Xiangzhong Zhang,……, Jinyong Wang*. Enforced expression of Hoxa5 in haematopoietic stem cells leads to aberrant erythropoiesis in vivo. Cell Cycle.2015; 14(4) 612-620.