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Chunming Liu, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
email: chliu@utmb.edu
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| Our long-term goal
is to investigate the molecular mechanisms of human cancers, and to use our knowledge of
cell signaling to develop novel methods for cancer diagnosis and therapeutics. We are
particularly interested in Wnt/β-catenin signaling, which plays pivotal roles in development
and tumorigenesis. β-catenin and APC (adenomatous polyposis coli) mutations are frequently
found in human cancers. Our previous work provided insights into how these mutations cause
β-catenin accumulation that leads to cancer (PNAS 1999; Cell, 2002; JBC 2006). We are also
interested in the crosstalk between Wnt signaling and other signaling pathways. We have
identified KLF4 as a novel inhibitor of b-catenin (MCB 2006). KLF4 is a tumor suppressor and a
key factor for stem cell re-programming. We found that KLF4 controls transcription by
regulating chromatin-remodeling (JBC 2007). We are collaborating with clinicians and
pathologists to study Wnt/β-catenin signaling in human cancers, especially GI cancers. We are
collaborating with chemical biologists to develop b-catenin inhibitors. As available evidence
pointed to the involvement of Wnt signaling in stem cell self-renewal, we are going to use
Wnt signaling as a molecular probe to explore the mechanism of stem cells, and to study the
role of stem cell in tumorigenesis.
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Graduate Students and Postdoc Positions are available,
please
contact Dr. Liu.
Liu C,
Kato Y, Zhang Z, Do VM, Yankner BA, He X. Beta-Trcp couples beta-catenin phosphorylation
degradation and regulates Xenopus axis formation.
Proc Natl Acad of Sci USA 96:6273-6278, 1999.
Tama, K, Semenov M, Kato Y, Spokony R,
Liu C,
Katsuyama Y, Hess F, Saint-Jeannet JP, He X. LDL-receptor-related proteins in Wnt signal
transduction.
Nature 407:530-535, 2000.
Liu C,
Li Y, Semenov M, Han C, Baeg G, Tan Y, Zhang Z, Lin X, He, X. Control of β-catenin
phosphorylaton/degradation by a dual-kinase mechanism. Cell 108:837-847,
2002.
Wu G,
Liu C,
He X. Ozz: A New Name on the Long List of β-Catenin's Nemeses.
Molecular Cell 13:451-453 (review), 2004.
Tamai K, Zeng X,
Liu C,
Zhang X, Harada Y, Chang Z, He X. A mechanism for Wnt co-receptor activation.
Molecular Cell 13:149-156, 2004.
Shao J, Jung C,
Liu C
and Sheng H. Prostaglandin E2 stimulates the beta-catenin/TCF-dependent transcription in colon
cancer.
J Biol Chem 280: 26565-26572, 2005.
Evans PM,
Liu C.
SiteFind: A software tool for introducing a restriction site as a marker for successful
site-directed mutagenesis.
BMC Molecular Biology 6:22, 2005.
Zhang W, Chen X, Kato Y, Evans PM, Yuan S, Yang
J, Rychahou PG, Yang VW, He X, Evers BM and
Liu C.
Novel crosstalk of
Krüppel-like factor 4 and b-catenin regulates normal
intestinal homeostasis and tumor repression.
Molecular and Cellular Biology 26: 2055-2064, 2006.
Yang J, Zhang W, Evans PM, Chen X, He X and
Liu C.
APC differentially regulates b-catenin phosphorylation and ubiquitination in colon cancer
cells.
J Biol Chem 281:17751-17757, 2006.
Zhang B, Luo S, Dong XP, Zhang X,
Liu C,
Luo Z, Xiong WC and Mei L. Beta-catenin regulates AChR clustering in muscle cells through
interaction with rapsyn.
Journal of Neuroscience 27: 3968-3973, 2007.
Evans PM, Zhang W, Chen X, Yang J, Bhakat K and
Liu C.
Krüppel-like factor 4 is acetylated by p300 and regulates gene transcription via modulation of
histone acetylation.
J Biol Chem
282: 33994-34002, 2007.
Link:
Wnt Page
Software - Molecular Biology Tools
