Regulation of Tissue Homeostasis and Inflammation by Cell-Cell and Cell-Environment Interactions
Event details
| Date | 21.01.2026 |
| Hour | 12:15 › 13:30 |
| Speaker | Prof. Xu Zhou, Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA (USA) |
| Location | Online |
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
| Event Language | English |
BIOENGINEERING SEMINAR
Abstract:
Inflammatory response is essential for defending tissue and organ integrity. When hosts encounter challenge of tissue homeostasis, such as infections or injuries, an inflammatory response is activated by the innate sensors recognizing cues associated with pathogens or tissue damage. These inflammatory triggers activate production of cytokines, chemokines and additional immune signals to mount host defense and tissue repair programs. A proper and successful inflammatory response restore tissue homeostasis. However, in excessive, inflammatory responses are known causes for significant tissue damage. Much of our knowledge in inflammation relates to the initiation of inflammatory responses and the impact on organs functions. By contrast, little is known of how state of a given tissue impacts the inflammatory response. My research program is focused on the emerging concept that the non-immune compartment of tissues actively modulates the inflammatory response. This concept is formulated based on two premises. First, the immune system never exists alone. in tissues, immune cells perform both homeostatic and defense functions in service of other cell types so the tissues can support organismal survival. Thus, the specific demands need to be communicated to the immune cells. Second, the critical balance between the beneficial and pathological impacts of inflammatory response demands it to be adjusted based on both the presence of inflammatory triggers and the extent of pathological outcome. Sensing deviation in tissue microenvironment by the immune system may provide such balancing mechanism.
My lab focuses on two major research areas: immune-stromal interactions and Immune-environment interactions. First, we aim to understand the molecular, cellular and functional bases of the interactions between immune and stromal cells to characterize governing principle of immune organization at tissue homeostasis and inflammation. Second, we are interested in discovering novel strategies for immune systems to sense, respond to and adapt to perturbation in pH environment, and design syntenic modules to control environment-dependent immunity.
Bio:
Xu Zhou is a Principal Investigator in the Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Nutrition at Boston Children’s Hospital, an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, and an Associate Member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. He grew up in Beijing, China, and received his B.S. from Peking University. He then earned his Ph.D. in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard University with Dr. Erin O’Shea, where his work focused on systems biology and transcriptional regulation.
Xu completed his postdoctoral training with Dr. Ruslan Medzhitov in the Department of Immunobiology at Yale University School of Medicine, where he studied the mechanisms governing tissue homeostasis and inflammation, with particular emphasis on macrophages and fibroblasts.
Since establishing his lab in 2021, the Zhou Lab has been interested in understanding how immune cells sense and integrate signals from neighboring cells and the local tissue environment to regulate homeostasis and inflammatory responses. Current research directions include macrophage-stromal cell interactions and mechanisms by which the immune system detects and responds to pH within and around cells.
Zoom link for attending remotely: https://epfl.zoom.us/j/63042357787
Instructions for 1st-year Ph.D. students planning to attend this talk, who are under EDBB’s mandatory seminar attendance rule:
IN CASE you cannot attend in-person in the room, please make sure to
Abstract:
Inflammatory response is essential for defending tissue and organ integrity. When hosts encounter challenge of tissue homeostasis, such as infections or injuries, an inflammatory response is activated by the innate sensors recognizing cues associated with pathogens or tissue damage. These inflammatory triggers activate production of cytokines, chemokines and additional immune signals to mount host defense and tissue repair programs. A proper and successful inflammatory response restore tissue homeostasis. However, in excessive, inflammatory responses are known causes for significant tissue damage. Much of our knowledge in inflammation relates to the initiation of inflammatory responses and the impact on organs functions. By contrast, little is known of how state of a given tissue impacts the inflammatory response. My research program is focused on the emerging concept that the non-immune compartment of tissues actively modulates the inflammatory response. This concept is formulated based on two premises. First, the immune system never exists alone. in tissues, immune cells perform both homeostatic and defense functions in service of other cell types so the tissues can support organismal survival. Thus, the specific demands need to be communicated to the immune cells. Second, the critical balance between the beneficial and pathological impacts of inflammatory response demands it to be adjusted based on both the presence of inflammatory triggers and the extent of pathological outcome. Sensing deviation in tissue microenvironment by the immune system may provide such balancing mechanism.
My lab focuses on two major research areas: immune-stromal interactions and Immune-environment interactions. First, we aim to understand the molecular, cellular and functional bases of the interactions between immune and stromal cells to characterize governing principle of immune organization at tissue homeostasis and inflammation. Second, we are interested in discovering novel strategies for immune systems to sense, respond to and adapt to perturbation in pH environment, and design syntenic modules to control environment-dependent immunity.
Bio:
Xu Zhou is a Principal Investigator in the Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Nutrition at Boston Children’s Hospital, an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, and an Associate Member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. He grew up in Beijing, China, and received his B.S. from Peking University. He then earned his Ph.D. in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard University with Dr. Erin O’Shea, where his work focused on systems biology and transcriptional regulation.
Xu completed his postdoctoral training with Dr. Ruslan Medzhitov in the Department of Immunobiology at Yale University School of Medicine, where he studied the mechanisms governing tissue homeostasis and inflammation, with particular emphasis on macrophages and fibroblasts.
Since establishing his lab in 2021, the Zhou Lab has been interested in understanding how immune cells sense and integrate signals from neighboring cells and the local tissue environment to regulate homeostasis and inflammatory responses. Current research directions include macrophage-stromal cell interactions and mechanisms by which the immune system detects and responds to pH within and around cells.
Zoom link for attending remotely: https://epfl.zoom.us/j/63042357787
Instructions for 1st-year Ph.D. students planning to attend this talk, who are under EDBB’s mandatory seminar attendance rule:
IN CASE you cannot attend in-person in the room, please make sure to
- send D. Reinhard a note well ahead of time (ideally before seminar day), informing that you plan to attend the talk online, and, during seminar:
- be signed in on Zoom with a recognizable user name (not any alias making it difficult or impossible to identify you).
Practical information
- Informed public
- Free