Jiajun Zhu

2006-2010, Dr. Zhu received his Bachelor’s degree from the School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University.

2010-2016, Dr. Zhu completed Ph.D. studies at the University of Pennsylvania in the US, under the mentorship of Dr. Shelley Berger. Dr. Zhu also obtained a Master’s degree in statistics from the Wharton School.

2016-2021, Dr. Zhu worked in the laboratory of Dr. Craig Thompson at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center as a postdoctoral research fellow.

2021-now, Dr. Zhu is appointed as an Assistant Professor at the School of Medicine, Tsinghua University.

 

Email：zhujiajun@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn

 

Research Area:

Dr. Zhu’s scientific research aims to reveal the molecular mechanism and metabolic basis of human diseases such as cancer, with a goal to improve therapeutic strategies for clinical treatment of the diseases.

 

Lab website: http://zhulabmetab.med.tsinghua.edu.cn

 

Selected publications：

1. Zhu J* (co-correspondance), Wang H, Jiang X*. mTORC1 beyond anabolic metabolism: Regulation of cell death. J Cell Biol. 2022

2.  Zhu J, Schwörer S, Berisa M, Kyung YJ, Ryu KW, Yi J, Jiang X, Cross JR, Thompson CB. Mitochondrial NADP(H) generation is essential for proline biosynthesis. Science. 2021

3. Zhu J, Berisa M, Schwörer S, Qin W, Cross JR, Thompson CB. Transsulfuration activity can support cell growth upon extracellular cysteine limitation. Cell Metabolism. 2019

4. Zhu J, Thompson CB. Metabolic control of cell growth and proliferation. Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol. 2019

5. Zhu J, Dou Z, Sammons MA, Levine AJ, Berger SL. Lysine methylation represses p53 activity in teratocarcinoma cancer cells. PNAS. 2016

6. Zhu J, Sammons MA, Donahue G, Dou Z, Vedadi M, Getlik M, Barsyte-Lovejoy D, Al-awar R, Katona BW, Shilatifard A, Huang J, Hua X, Arrowsmith CH, Berger SL. Gain-of-function p53 mutants co-opt chromatin pathways to drive cancer growth. Nature. 2015

7. Pavlova NN*, Zhu J* (equal contribution), Thompson CB. The hallmarks of cancer metabolism: Still emerging. Cell Metabolism. 2022

8. Yi J*, Zhu J* (equal contribution), Wu J, Thompson CB, Jiang X. Oncogenic activation of PI3K-AKT-mTOR signaling suppresses ferroptosis via SREBP-mediated lipogenesis. PNAS. 2020

9. Sammons MA*, Zhu J* (equal contribution), Berger SL. A chromatin-focued siRNA screen for regulators of p53-dependent transcription. G3 (Genes Genomes Genetics). 2016