Research Interests

• The immune system is the major defense against tumorigenesis and tumor progression. However, many tumors acquire the ability to blunt or even invert the functions of the immune system. We are interested in the question of how gastrointestinal cancers evolve to induce dysfunctions of the immune system and also how gut microbiota interacts with the immune systems to affect the occurrence, development and metastasis of tumor. In particular, we focus on the search for cancer-promoting and cancer-suppressing intestinal microbiota. The questions we are trying to attack include: 1) how the systemic and local immune environment varies among gastrointestinal cancers with diverse gut microbiota；2) how to identify the critical immune cell types/functions in a specific tumor context; and 3) how different tumors evolve dependencies on specific immune cells and special gut microbiota. Our ultimate goal is to identify therapies that could restore the normal functions of the immune system including fecal bacteria transplantation.