Chen Lab University of California, Irvine

NEWS

2024

HCA Nature Collection

Our lab’s research, Zhen’s publication titled “Single cell dual-omic atlas of the human developing retina” has been selected for inclusion in the HCA Nature Collection, “The Human Cell Atlas: towards a first draft atlas” In this study, we offer a detailed single-nuclei dual-omic atlas of the human developing retina, examining around 220,000 nuclei from 14 human embryos and fetuses aged 8 to 23 weeks post-conception. This atlas encompasses both macular and peripheral tissues, capturing all ma...

Zhen’s Public Defense

We have a new PhD: Congratulations to Dr. Zhen Zuo! We are so proud of you!

Lab Relocation

Our lab is relocating to the University of California, Irvine. We will begin a new chapter at Irvine in Ophthalmology and Genetics Research.

CZI Data Insights Cycle 3 Grantee Announcement

The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) Data Insights Cycle 3 grantee announcement is now available! These projects aim to support researchers and computational experts in developing tools and resources to extract deeper insights into health and disease from existing single-cell biology datasets. Our lab will continue collaborating with Dr. Ken Chen’s team from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center on the project “Insights into the Somatic Mutation Landscape of Single-Cell Omics.” T...

Grant awarded to Dr. Hafiz Muhammad Jafar Hussain

We are enthusiastic to share the news about the Career-Starter Research Grant awarded to Dr. Hafiz Muhammad Jafar Hussain by The Knights Templar Eye Foundation. Dr. Hafiz Muhammad Jafar Hussain, a Postdoctoral Associate at our lab, has been awarded a substantial grant of $90,000 from The Knights Templar Eye Foundation to support his research on retinal diseases. This funding is part of the Foundation’s commitment to backing researchers dedicated to the treatment and preventio...

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Jinjing Jian Ph.D.!

New Bioinformatics Programmer II

We welcome new bioinformatics programmer Tingting Yang Ph.D.!

Lunar New Year Party

We have a wonderful lab party to celebrate the Lunar New Year of 2024. We enjoy the games and food and have a lot of fun. Happy Spring Festival to everyone!!!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Sujung Soh Ph.D.!

2023

New Bioinformatics Programmer I

We welcome new bioinformatics programmer Shanli Ding!

Holiday Party

We have a wonderful lab party as we get closer to the end of 2023. We enjoy the escape games and the dinner and have a lot of fun. Happy holidays to everyone!!!

Jiaxiong’s Public Defense

We have a new PhD: Congratulations to Dr. Jiaxiong Lu! We are so proud of you!

New Research Technician III

We welcome new research technician Aurian Maleki!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Arpit Katiyar Ph.D.!

Johnny’s Public Defense

We have a new PhD: Congratulations to Dr. Johnny (Jongsu) Choi! We are so proud of you!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Ye Zheng M.D., Ph.D.!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Yexuan Cao Ph.D.!

Science article on SMaHT

Science published an article featuring the Somatic Mosaicism Across Human Tissues (SMaHT) program of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), in which our lab participated. “For SMaHT, five groups of researchers plan to use several techniques to ferret out and verify these hidden signals. Doddapaneni, his Baylor colleague Rui Chen, and their team, for example, will deploy not just conventional whole genome DNA sequencing, but also two types of RNA sequencing, which can help confirm some vari...

Summer Lab Party

Before the new semester begins, we throw an amazing lab party. We delight in designing our own ceramic pieces with brushes, stamps, and stencils, and it’s a ton of fun. 1/5 1/5 Xinye's graduation

Vizgen Installs 100th MERSCOPE® Instrument at our core lab

Vizgen, a life science company committed to enhancing human health through the visualization of single-cell spatial genomics information, reached a significant milestone by successfully installing its 100th MERSCOPE instrument. The installation took place in the Single Cell Genomics Core at Baylor College of Medicine Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, which is under the leadership of Dr. Rui Chen. As one of the first adopters of the Alpha MERSCOPE® platform, the Core r...

Xinye’s Public Defense

We have a new PhD: Congratulations to Dr. Xinye Qian! We are so proud of you!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Jianming Shao Ph.D.!

New Research Technician II

We welcome new Research Technician Jean Li!

New Undergraduate Researchers

We welcome new undergraduate researchers Atulya Dhati Mandyam, David Eldon Rauch, Elie Jinglin Wang, Grace Chaewon Park and Jocelyn Megan Lee. Hope you enjoy your summer research experience:)

National Institutes of Health SMaHT Grant

It is exciting to announce our project was presented as part of a new National Institutes of Health (NIH) Common Fund program called the Somatic Mosaicism across Human Tissues (SMaHT) Network. Baylor College of Medicine received the grant to develop state-of-the-art tools to catalog the extent of somatic mosaicism in different cell types, tissues and life stages, to better understand how much somatic mosaicism influences human biology and disease. With the grant, Baylor will establish a geno...

ARVO Annual Meeting 2023

We have an incredible experience showcasing some of our research works and interacting with the most brilliant individuals from around the globe at ARVO 2023 in New Orleans, LA! Talks Session Eye Development: Regulatory Mechanisms and Networks Zhen: “Single-nuclei Multiomics Analysis of Human Fetal Retina” Session Genomic dissection of the eye using ‘omics and single cell technology Jin: “Single cell atlas of the human retina” Session Regulation of lipid metabolism i...

Birthday Cake of February

Happy Birthday to Xuesen!!!

Birthday Cake of January

Happy Birthday to Jun!!!

2022

Holiday Party

We have a wonderful lab party as we get closer to the end of 2022. We enjoy the dinner and karaoke and have a lot of fun. Happy Birthday to Jin!!! Happy holidays to everyone!!!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Gerda Cristal Villalba Silva Ph.D.!

New Funding from NEI

The Anterior Segment Initiative under National Eye Institute has funded eight research projects to explore the innervation of the eye’s surface. It is exciting to announce that our lab is involved in one of the projects “Effects of cornea epithelial barrier disruption on the cornea trigeminal neural circuit”. Corneal nerve ends closely integrate with the corneal epithelial layers. Our lab will collaborate to investigate how disruptions to the corneal epithelial barrier influence corneal nerv...

Birthday Cake of October

Happy Birthday to Sangbae, Xuan and Meng!!!

Johnny wins the 2nd best talk at CPSB Retreat 2022

Congratulations to Johnny for winning the second place for best talk at 2022 Chemical, Physical and Structural Biology Retreat!

2022 Translational Research Acceleration Program (TRAP) Grant Award

It is exciting to announce our project was presented as an awarded project at 2022 Translational Research Acceleration Program (TRAP). The Translational Research Acceleration Program (TRAP) awards will accelerate the movement of preclinical research toward an Investigational New Drug filing and into clinical trials to provide a robust and diverse pipeline of potential therapies to fight inherited retinal degenerations (IRD) and dry age-related macular degeneration. Our Project Title is “Ret...

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Hafiz Muhammad Jafar Hussain Ph.D.!

Birthday Cake of September

Happy Birthday to Johnny!!!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Huayang Chen Ph.D.!

Summer Lab Party

We have a great lab party before new semester starts. We enjoy bowling and laser tag and have a lot of fun. Happy Birthday to Xinye!!!

Birthday Cake of July

Happy Birthday to Alice!!!

New Postdoctoral Associate

We welcome new postdoctoral researcher Ismail Yaman M.D.!

Birthday Cake of June

Happy Birthday to Jiaxiong and Salma!!!

New Undergraduate Researchers

We welcome new undergraduate researchers Alice Tian, Giancarlo Valenzuela, Jessica He, Joseph Quinlan, Karen Zheng, Kirim Kim, Maggie Bao, Soo Oh and Tanmay Srinivasan. Hope you enjoy your summer research experience:)

Jiaxiong wins the Dance Contest of MHG Retreat 2022

Congratulations to Jiaxiong for winning the Ken Scott Dance Contest during 2022 Molecular and Human Genetics Retreat!

Qingnan’s Graduation

We have a new PhD: Congratulations to Dr. Qingnan Liang! We are so proud of you!

Jin's poster at The Biology of Genomes 2022

Jin will be presenting his poster “Single cell atlas of the human retina” at The Biology of Genomes 2022 from May 10 to May 14. Single-cell technologies have become powerful tools for studying cellular components, transcriptome relationships, and regulatory mechanisms underlying various retinal diseases and biological processes. Single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) has advanced the assessment of cellular heterogeneity by detecting transcriptional similarities and differences...

ARVO Annual Meeting 2022

Talks Session Application of multi-omics to inherited ocular disease Rui: “Deciphering non-coding genetic variants via integrative single cell multi-omics analysis” Session Single cell analysis in retinal research in health and disease Salma: “Spatial single cell atlas of the mouse retina using MERFISH” Xuesen: “A single cell multi-omics atlas of the human retina” Zhen: “Single-cell Multiomics Analysis of Human Retinal Development” Posters Session Molecu...