Biography

Dr.  Min JIANG (1986-), received her B.S. in Medicine from Nanjing Medical University  in 2009. Then, she got her Ph.D. from the State Key Laboratory of Reproductive  Medicine at Nanjing Medical University in 2014. After that, she worked as a  postdoctoral researcher at Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing till 2019.  Dr. Jiang joined the Westlake University at School of Life Sciences in September  2019 as an assistant professor (independent PI).

Research

Mitochondria  work not only as a “powerhouse” in the cells, but also participate in the  biosynthesis of Fe-S clusters, regulation of apoptosis, fatty acid oxidation and  so on. Functional mitochondria are under the dual regulation of nuclear DNA and  its own DNA. The circular mammalian mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) harbors 37 genes,  which encodes 2 ribosome RNA, 22 transfer RNA and 13 proteins(the critical parts  of oxidative phosphorylation complexes). The expression and maintenance of mtDNA  are under many nuclear genes’ regulation, including transcription factor A  (Tfam), DNA polymerase (PolgA), RNA polymerase (Polrmt), helicase (Twinkle),  single strand binding protein (mtSSB) and so on. Similar to nuclear DNA, the  defects of mtDNA expression can cause many diseases, such as MELAS, LHON, Leigh  syndrome, myopathy, deafness and so on. Our previous research proved that mtDNA  point mutation could also lead to severer male infertility. Beyond that, through  manipulating total mtDNA copy number, we successfully rescued male infertility,  and demonstrated that the threshold of infertile-causing mtDNA point mutation  could be determined by the absolute number of wild type mtDNA level. Our future  research interest will focus on: 1) the molecular mechanisms of mtDNA gene  expression and maintenance. 2) the function of mtDNA on spermatogenesis and  oogenesis, especially the mechanism of mtDNA maternal transmission.

Representative  Publications

1. M. Jiang^#, X. Xie^#, X. Zhu^#, S. Jiang, D. Milenkovic, J. Misic, Y. Shi, N. Tandukar, X. Li, I. Atanassov, L. Jenninger, E. Hoberg, S. Albarran-Gutierrez, Z. Szilagyi, B. Macao, S. J. Siira, V. Carelli, J. D. Griffith, C. M. Gustafsson, T. J. Nicholls, A. Filipovska, N.-G. Larsson, M. Falkenberg, The mitochondrial single-stranded DNA binding protein is essential for initiation of mtDNA replication. Sci Adv. 7, eabf8631 (2021).

2. D. Alsina, O. Lytovchenko, A. Schab, I. Atanassov, F. A. Schober, M. Jiang, C. Koolmeister, A. Wedell, R. W. Taylor, A. Wredenberg, N. Larsson, FBXL4 deficiency increases mitochondrial removal by autophagy. Embo Mol Med. 12, e11659 (2020).

3. S. Jiang, C. Koolmeister, J. Misic, S. Siira, I. Kühl, E. S. Ramos, M. Miranda, M. Jiang, V. Posse, O. Lytovchenko, I. Atanassov, F. A. Schober, R. Wibom, K. Hultenby, D. Milenkovic, C. M. Gustafsson, A. Filipovska, N. Larsson, TEFM regulates both transcription elongation and RNA processing in mitochondria. Embo Rep. 20, e48101 (2019).

4. S. Matic, M. Jiang, T. J. Nicholls, J. P. Uhler, C. Dirksen-Schwanenland, P. L. Polosa, M.-L. Simard, X. Li, I. Atanassov, O. Rackham, A. Filipovska, J. B. Stewart, M. Falkenberg, N.-G. Larsson, D. Milenkovic, Mice lacking the mitochondrial exonuclease MGME1 accumulate mtDNA deletions without developing progeria. Nat Commun. 9, 1202 (2018).

5. M. Jiang, T. E. S. Kauppila, E. Motori, X. Li, I. Atanassov, K. Folz-Donahue, N. A. Bonekamp, S. Albarran-Gutierrez, J. B. Stewart, N.-G. Larsson, Increased Total mtDNA Copy Number Cures Male Infertility Despite Unaltered mtDNA Mutation Load. Cell Metab. 26, 429-436.e4 (2017).

6. M. Jiang^#, M. Gao^#, C. Wu^#, H. He, X. Guo, Z. Zhou, H. Yang, X. Xiao, G. Liu, J. Sha, Lack of testicular seipin causes teratozoospermia syndrome in men. Proc National Acad Sci. 111, 7054–7059 (2014).

7. G. Sun, M. Jiang, T. Zhou, Y. Guo, Y. Cui, X. Guo, J. Sha, Insights into the lysine acetylproteome of human sperm. J Proteomics. 109, 199–211 (2014).

8. Y. Qi^#, M. Jiang^#, Y. Yuan, Y. Bi, B. Zheng, X. Guo, X. Huang, Z. Zhou, J. Sha, ADP-ribosylation factor-like 3, a manchette-associated protein, is essential for mouse spermiogenesis. Molecular Human Reproduction. 19, 327–335 (2013).

9. M. Zhang, M. Jiang, Y. Bi, H. Zhu, Z. Zhou, J. Sha, Autophagy and Apoptosis Act as Partners to Induce Germ Cell Death after Heat Stress in Mice. Plos One. 7, e41412 (2012).

# These authors contribute equally