Lifeng Xu
Assistant Professor
lfxu@ucdavis.edu
Microbiology and Molecular Genetics
Office
313 Briggs Hall
Office 530-752-3660
Lab 530-752-1088
Degrees:
2000
PhD
Princeton University
Molecular Biology
1993
BS
Fudan University
Biology
Research Interests:
Telomeres are the protective nucleoprotein structures at the ends of linear eukaryotic chromosomes. Telomere dysfunction contributes to cancer progression and aging. Our laboratory employs molecular and cytological approaches to study telomere maintenance in human normal cells and cancer cells.
Awards:
2000-2003 Susan G. Komen Postdoctoral Fellowship
2011 March of Dimes - Basil O'Connor Award
2012 American Cancer Society Research Scholar
Department and Center Affiliations:
Microbiology
UC Davis Cancer Center
CBS Graduate Group Affiliations:
Biochemistry, Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology
Genetics
Specialties / Focus:
Biochemistry, Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology
Cell Biology
Chromosome Dynamics and Nuclear Function
Genetics
Chromosome Biology
Graduate Groups not Housed in CBS:
Microbiology
Publications:
Last updated 8/5/2010
Stohr, B.A., Xu, L., Blackburn, E.H. The Terminal Telomeric DNA Sequence Determines the Mechanism of Dysfunctional Telomere Fusion. Mol. Cell 39: 307-314 (2010).
Wang, X., Kam, Z., Carlton, P.M., Xu, L., Sedat, J.W., Blackburn, E.H. Rapid telomere motions in live human cells analyzed by highly time-resolved microscopy. Epigenetics Chromatin. 1(1):4. (2008)
Xu, L and Blackburn, E.H. Human cancer cells harbor t-stumps, a distinct class of extremely short telomeres. Mol. Cell 28: 315-327 (2007)
Xu, L and Blackburn, E.H. Human Rif1 protein binds aberrant telomeres and aligns along anaphase midzone microtubules. J. Cell Biol. 167: 819-830 (2004)
Ly, H.*, Xu, L.*, Rivera, M.A., Parslow, T.G., Blackburn, E.H. A role for a novel ‘transpseudoknot’ RNA-RNA interaction in the functional dimerization of human telomerase. Genes Dev. 17:1078-1083 (2003)
Kim, M., Xu, L., Blackburn, E.H. Catalytically active human telomerase mutants with allele-specific biological properties. Exp. Cell Res. 288:277-287 (2003)
Comolli, L.R., Smirnov, I., Xu, L., Blackburn, E.H., James, T.L. A molecular switch underlies a human telomerase disease. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 99: 16998-17003 (2002)
Tao, W., Pennica, D., Xu, L., Kalejta, R.F., Levine A.J. Wrch-1, a novel member of the Rho gene family that is regulated by Wnt-1. Genes Dev. 15: 1796-1807 (2001)
Xu, L., Corcoran, R.B., Welsh, J.W., Pennica, D., Levine A.J. WISP-1 is a Wnt-1 and ß-catenin responsive oncogene. Genes Dev. 14: 585-595 (2000)
Laboratory Personnel:
341 Briggs Hall
Bernadette Nera, Annie Sum-Ying Chiu, BMCDB Graduate Student; Amanda Frank, Postdoctoral Fellow; Anne Nguyen, Duy Tran, Nestor Huang, Sara Balla, Undergraduate Student