Education

1992 Nanjing University School of Medicine – B.S. – Medicine
1994 Nanjing University School of Medicine – M.D. – Clinical Medicine
2004 Southern Illinois University – Ph.D. – Biochemistry & Molecular Biology

Research

The rupture of vulnerable atherosclerotic plaques and the resulting thrombosis are the direct causes of heart attack and stroke, the No. 1 and No. 3 killers in the United States and many other developed countries. Atherosclerosis is both a lipid deposit disease and a chronic inflammatory condition. Macrophages are the primary cholesterol sinks as well as dominant inflammation machines in atherogenesis. Macrophage foam cell formation and inflammatory responses form a vicious cycle and promote atherogenesis. The goal of the research in our laboratory is to develop strategies to disrupt the vicious cycle and promote the regression of atherosclerotic plaques through restoring macrophage cholesterol homeostasis and controlling macrophage inflammation.

Myeloid cells are the major cell component of the tumor microenvironment (TME), whose interaction with malignant cells determines the aggressiveness of the tumor. Myeloid cells in TME are mainly myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) and tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs). In advanced tumors, due to the unique features in TME including hypoxia, abundance in cytokines/chemokines and Toll-like receptor (TLR) ligands, and an unusual metabolic profile, a complex signaling network tunes the dynamics and function of the myeloid cells in favor of cancer progression. Our research is focused on understanding this signal network and developing strategies to manipulate it to improve cancer treatment.

Publications

Saaoud F, Wang J, Iwanowycz S, Wang Y, Altomare D, Shao Y, Liu J, Blackshear PJ, Lessner SM, Murphy EA, Wang H, Yang X, Fan D.  (2020) Bone marrow deficiency of mRNA decaying protein Tristetraprolin increases inflammation and mitochondrial ROS but reduces hepatic lipoprotein production in LDLR knockout mice. Redox Biol. 2020 Jun 17;:101609. doi: 10.1016/j.redox.2020.101609. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed PMID: 32591281

Li Y, Sun W, Saaoud F, Wang Y, Wang Q, Hodge J, Hui Y, Yin S, Lessner SM, Kong X, Fan D. (2020) MiR155 modulates vascular calcification by regulating Akt-FOXO3a signaling and apoptosis in vascular smooth muscle cells. J Cell Mol Med. 2020 Nov 18. doi: 10.1111/jcmm.16107. PMID: 33210462

Qing Liu, Johnie Hodge, Junfeng Wang, Yuzhen Wang, Lianming Wang, Udai Singh, Yong Li, Yongzhong Yao, Dawei Wang, Walden Ai, Prakash Nagarkatti, Hexin Chen, Peisheng Xu, E. Angela Murphy and Daping Fan. (2020) Emodin reduces Breast Cancer Lung Metastasis by suppressing Macrophage-induced Breast Cancer Cell Epithelial-mesenchymal transition and Cancer Stem Cell formation. Theranostics 2020, 10(18). 8365-8381. PMID: 32724475

Li Y, Hodge J, Liu Q, Wang J, Wang Y, Evans TD, Altomare D, Yao Y, Murphy EA, Razani B, Fan D. (2020) TFEB is a master regulator of tumor-associated macrophages in breast cancer.  J Immunother Cancer. 2020 Jun;8(1):e000543. doi: 10.1136/jitc-2020-000543. PMID: 32487570

Johnie Hodge, Fang Wang, Junfeng Wang, Qing Liu, Fatma Saaoud, Yuzhen Wang, Udai P. Singh, Hexin Chen, Ming Luo, Walden Ai, and Daping Fan. (2020) Overexpression of microRNA-155 enhances the efficacy of dendritic cell vaccine against breast cancer. Oncoimmunology. 2020 Feb 9;9(1):1724761. doi: 10.1080/2162402X.2020.1724761. eCollection 2020. PMID: 32117588

Xiangyu Zhang, Ismail Sergin, Trent D. Evans, Se-Jin Jeong, Astrid Rodriguez-Velez, Divya Kapoor, Sunny Chen, Eric Song, Karyn B. Holloway, Jan R. Crowley, Slava Epelman, Conrad C. Weihl, Abhinav Diwan, Daping Fan, Bettina Mittendorfer, Nathan O. Stitziel, Joel D. Schilling, Irfan J. Lodhi, and Babak Razani. (2020) High protein diets increase cardiovascular risk by activating macrophage mTOR to suppress mitophagy. Nature Metabolism. Nat Metab. 2020 Jan;2(1):110-125. doi: 10.1038/s42255-019-0162-4. Epub 2020 Jan 23. PMID: 32128508

Yanyong Xu,Yang Xu, Yingdong Zhu, Huihui Sun, Liya Yin, Feng Li, Daping Fan, and Yanqiao Zhang. (2020) Macrophage MiR-34a Is A Key Regulator of Cholesterol Efflux and Atherosclerosis. Mol Ther. 2020 Jan 8;28(1):202-216. doi: 10.1016/j.ymthe.2019.09.008. Epub 2019 Sep 12.PMID: 31604677

Sougiannis AT, VanderVeen BN, Davis JM, Fan D, Murphy EA. (2021) Understanding chemotherapy-induced intestinal mucositis and strategies to improve gut resilience. Am J Physiol Gastrointest Liver Physiol. 2021 Jan 20. doi: 10.1152/ajpgi.00380.2020. Online ahead of print. PMID: 33471628

Sougiannis AT, Enos RT, VanderVeen BN, Velazquez KT, Kelly B, McDonald S, Cotham W, Chatzistamou I, Nagarkatti M, Fan D, Murphy EA. (2021) Safety of natural anthraquinone emodin: an assessment in mice. BMC Pharmacol Toxicol. 2021 Jan 28;22(1):9. doi: 10.1186/s40360-021-00474-1.PMID: 33509280

Hai-jun Liu, Junfeng Wang, Mingming Wang, Yuzhen Wang, Shanshan Shi, Xiangxiang Hu, Quanguang Zhang, Daping Fan, and Peisheng Xu. (2021) Biomimetic Nanomedicine Coupled with Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy to Suppress Breast Cancer Metastasis via Tumor Microenvironment Remodeling. Adv. Funct. Mater. 2021, 2100262

Find Dr. Daping Fan on PubMed»