DR. XILING SHEN'S LABORATORY
ABOUT DR. XILING SHEN
Dr. Xiling Shen is the chief scientific officer of the Terasaki Institute, responsible for executing its scientific missions. He is also the Scientific Founder of Xilis, Inc, a precision oncology company that raised $70M Series-A financing in July, 2021. Prior to joining Terasaki, he was the Hawkins Family Associate Professor and director of the Woo Center for Big Data and Precision Health at Duke University. He received his BS, MS, and PhD degrees from Stanford University and the NSF junior faculty career award at Cornell University. He was the steering committee chair of the NCI Patient-Derived Model of Cancer Consortium, chair of the NCI Tissue Engineering Consortium 2021 conference, and cancer track chair of BMES 2019. His lab studies precision medicine from a systems biology perspective. Areas of interests include cancer, stem cells, the gut-brain axis, and intravital imaging.
RESEARCH OVERVIEW
Dr. Shen’s lab specializes in precision medicine and systems biology. His members integrate biological, engineering, and computational techniques to study cancer, stem cells, and the gut-brain axis.
Precision medicine
Dr. Shen is the Scientific Founder of the company Xilis, which developed a droplet organoid technology termed micro-organospheres (MOS). Several clinical trials are ongoing in both US and Europe to validate the ability of MOS to predict patient outcomes. He founded the company, Xilis Inc., with Drs. Hans Clevers and David Hsu, to develop MOS-based clinical diagnostics that has received a $70M series-A. His lab is further developing this technology for applications including immunotherapy, stem cell regeneration, autoimmune diseases, host-microbe interactome, and infectious diseases.
Cancer Metastasis
Mixed response to chemotherapy between primary tumors and metastases occurs in a significant fraction of patients, supporting the existence of important biological differences between the two. The Shen lab was the first to demonstrate that metastatic colorectal cancer undergo metabolic and epigenetic reprogramming in the liver. New therapeutic development to target the metabolic and epigenetic reprogramming axes have led to clinical trials and pharma partnerships.
Gut-brain axis and Neuromodulation
Dr. Shen leads the Chan-Zuckerberg Human Atlas Along the Gut-Brain Axis program. With deeper understanding of the gut-brain axis using cutting-edge tools such as single-cell sequencing and viral tracing, the Shen lab is developing novel neuromodulation methods to treat a variety of systemic diseases.
Intravital imaging
The Shen lab developed the first intestinal window with scaffold and graphene sensors to measure the enteric nervous system in real time. They then developed the first intravital colon window to study stem cells, inflammation, and peripheral stimulation in the colon. They also developed the very first embryonic window that allowed real-time imaging of embryos and organogenesis. Ongoing projects include improving transplantation and chimeric efficiencies for disease modeling and therapeutic development.
Team
Anders Dohlman
Yanru Wu
Shree Bose
Kun Xiang
Ergang Wang
Aliesha O' Raw
Tomer Rotstein
Chi Wut (William) Wong
RESEARCH PAPERS
ALUMNI
Shengli Ding (Senior scientist, Xilis Inc)
Kendall Lough (postdoc, UNC)
Ian Williamson (postdoc, Duke)
Yanru Wu (postdoc, Duke)
LIhua Wang (staff scientist, Xilis Inc)
Zhiguo Sun
Robert Mines
Rui Xi (scientist, Xilis Inc)
Kuei-Ling Tung (postdoc, University of California San Francisco)
Preetish K. L. Murthy (postdoc, Duke University)
Nikolai Rakhilin (Post-doc, Pfizer)
Yong-Jun Shin (Assistant Professor, BME, UConn)
Christelle Haibi-Johnson (Field Application Scientist, Personalis Inc)
Huanhuan Joyce Chen (Assistant Professor, Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering and Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of Chicago)
Kim Heiman Chow (Assistant Professor, School of Life Science, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK))
Daniel Jo (R&D engineer, Samsung)
Tara Srinivasan (R&D scientist, Sangamo Biosciences)
Yan Han (Principle Scientist, Curacloud Inc)
Pengcheng Bu (Assistant Professor, Institute of Biophysics of Chinese Academy of Sciences)
Kai-Yuan Chen (Research scientist, Intellia Therapeutics)
Yitian Xu (postdoc, Baylor College of Medicine)