Research
The research interest of our group is to understand the fundamental questions of howin vitro culture-expanded cells regenerate tissue and organin vivo, and to develop a new cell-based therapeutic strategy for repairing the function-damaged tissues such skin and tooth. Our group recently developed an isolation and culture system to maintain multi-potential of skin cells, which can regenerate human skin with appendages after transplantation onto immunosuppressed mice. Using this technology, our laboratory created a mouse model with human regenerated skin, providing an unprecedented platform for the study of human skin diseases. At present, the research we are carrying out focus on the following directions: (1) the application of culture-expanded cells for wound healing, mainly studying the molecular mechanism of skin wound healing and translational medicine; (2) hair regeneration, mainly exploring the source and application of new source cells for hair regeneration; (3) tooth regeneration, mainly focus on oral epithelium regeneration; (4) skin or oral tumors, mainly studying the molecular mechanisms in the occurrence and development of skin or oral epithelial tumors.
Funding information
Our research are supported by supported by The National Key Research and Development Program of China (2017YFA0104500), the General Program of National Natural Science Foundation of China (81572681 and 81772093) and The Key Research and Development Program of Shandong Province (2019GSF108107).
People
Our group consists of one senior scientist, four postdoc. fellows, one PhD student, two graduate students and two technicians.
Representative Publications
Mi J, Feng Y, Wen J, Su Y, Xu L, Zu T, Liu C, Fisher DE,Wu X*. (2019)A ROCK inhibitor promotes keratinocyte survival and paracrine secretion, enhancing establishment of primary human melanocytes and melanocyte-keratinocyte co-cultures. Pigment Cell Melanoma Res. doi: 10.1111/pcmr.12816. [Epub ahead of print]
Leng X, Wang P, Chen Z, Li D, Wen J, Zhang X, Qian H, Guo J,Wu X*.(2018)Dissociated skin cells regenerate hair follicles in a microwound, "The Punch Assay". Exp Dermatol. doi: 10.1111/exd.13753. [Epub ahead of print]
Chang F, Zhang Y, Mi J, Zhou Q, Bai F, Xu X, Fisher DE, Sun Q,Wu X*. (2018) ROCK inhibitor enhances the growth and migration of BRAF-mutant skin melanoma cells. Cancer Sci.109(11):3428-3437. doi: 10.1111/cas.13786
Wu X*, Tommasi di Vignano A, Zhou Q, Michel-Dziunycz PJ, Bai F, Mi J, Qin J, Zu T, Hofbauer GFL. (2018) The ARE-binding protein Tristetraprolin (TTP) is a novel target and mediator of calcineurin tumor suppressing function in the skin. PLoS Genet. 3;14(5):e1007366. doi: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1007366. [Epub ahead of print]
Wen J, Zu T, Zhou Q, Leng X, Wu X*. (2018)Y-27632 simplifies the isolation procedure of human primary epidermal cells by selectively blocking focal adhesion of dermal cells. J Tissue Eng Regen Med,12(2):e1251-e1255. doi: 10.1002/term.2526.
Wu X, Fisher DE.(2017)Negative Regulation of Skin Pigmentation in Three-Dimensional Reconstructs by Adipose-Derived Mesenchymal Cells. J Invest Dermatol. 2017 Dec;137(12):2464-2466.
Zhang Q, Zu T, Zhou Q, Wen J, Leng X, Wu X*(2017)The patch assay reconstitutes mature hair follicles by culture-expanded human cells. Regen Med. 12(5):503-511.
Wen J, Li X, Leng X, Xu X,Wu X*. (2017)An advanced mouse model for human skin wound healing. Exp. Dermatol. 26(5):433-435.
Wu X*, Scott L Jr, Washenik K, Stenn K. (2014)Full-thickness skin with mature hair follicles generated from tissue culture expanded human cells. Tissue Eng Part A. Dec;20(23-24):3314-21.
Wu X, Nguyen BC, Dziunycz P, Chang S, Brooks Y, Lefort K, Hofbauer GF, Dotto GP. (2010)Opposing roles for calcineurin and ATF3 in squamous skin cancer. Nature. 20;465(7296):368-72.
