Guest Editors
Ming-Lin Liu
University of Pennsylvania, Perelman School of Medicine, Department of Dermatology, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA.
Dr Liu is a faculty at Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania. He received his medical education from Tianjin Medical University, China. He then practiced as an internist and worked on aging patients with cardio-metabolic, and autoimmune diseases for about 10 years in Tianjin Medical University General Hospital. After that, he received his PhD training from the University of Helsinki, Finland, and went on to pursue his postdoctoral training in Thomas Jefferson University in the US. His current research interest focuses on cell death and inflammation, as well as the release of extracellular NETs (neutrophil extracellular traps) or extracellular vesicles from dead cells, and their involvement in autoimmune and cardio-metabolic diseases. By far, he has published over 40 publications, among which over 20 publications are related to extracellular vesicles or extracellular NETs, which are from original research, review articles, and book chapters in the area of cardio-metabolic and autoimmune diseases. His ongoing research projects are about mechanistic involvement of extracellular NETs or extracellular vesicles in cutaneous and systemic lupus. In addition, he investigates the effects of UVB exposure on skin inflammation, cutaneous lupus, and systemic lupus. In this Method Collections, he, and his co-guest editors, will work together to bring research methods together for lupus research community.
Jian Hao
Tianjin Medical University General Hospital, China, Department of Rheumatology, China
Dr. Hao obtained her medical degree from Tianjin Medical University, China. She pursued her internal medicine residency and work on patients with autoimmune diseases for about 3 years at the Tianjin Medical University General Hospital. Her research has focused on immunoregulatory and antitumor mechanism of traditional Chinese herbal medicine. She has found the main components of Xi-huang Pill, which have high affinities with estrogen receptor α. So far, as the first or co-first author, she has published 7 original research articles, and is the principal investigator of one grant from the National Natural Science Foundation of China. She is also a lecturer at the Tianjin Medical Publishing Group. She is interested in the relationship between sex and lupus in basic mechanistic study with animal models. Currently, she is working on a project on the effects of estrogen-like components of Xi-huang Pill on lupus mouse model, as estrogen plays a vital role in the regulation of the lupus development.
Wei Wei
Tianjin Medical University General Hospital, Department of Rheumatology, China.
Dr. Wei obtained her medical degree from Tianjin Medical University, China. She then did her internal medicine residency, as well as her rheumatology training at the Tianjin Medical University General Hospital, where she was a member of the faculty for more than 30 years. She is also honored as a professor and doctoral supervisor of rheumatology at the Tianjin Medical University. Dr. Wei’s research interest focuses on the role of extracellular vesicles in lupus, which may contribute to the development of autoimmune responses and to end-organ damage. Prof. Wei also has an interest in the etiology mechanisms of connective tissue disease associated pulmonary artery hypertension, that may prevent vascular damage in systemic autoimmunity. By far, she has already received more than 10 national and provincial research grants, and published more than 30 publications, including publications at the J Autoimmun, Autoimmun Rev, Ann Rheum Dis etc. In addition, Dr. Wei has been elected as a Famous Clinician in Tianjin, China. She consults patients with SLE, rheumatoid arthritis, polymyositis, etc. She is also involved in various clinical trials. Under her leadership, the department ranks one of the top rheumatology department in China, with an annual inpatient population of more than 2000, and an annual outpatient of nearly 100,000. She has served various academic roles, such as permanent member of Chinese Rheumatology Association, vice chairperson of permanent member of Internal Medicine Branch of Rheumatic Diseases, Chinese Physicians’ Association, chairperson of Tianjin Rheumatology Association, etc.
Collection Overview
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a chronic and complex autoimmune disease that is characterized by dysregulation of immune responses, increased production of autoantibodies, complement activation, and immune complex deposition. This leads to damage of multiple organs, which includes skin, kidney, lungs, digestive system, central nervous system etc. The etiology of SLE is still unknown. Current studies indicate the involvement of disordered innate and adaptive immune responses, activation of various immune cells, and increased production of pro-inflammatory cytokines. These pathological changes may take place locally in the affected organ/tissues, and/or systematically in the entire body of patients suffering from lupus. In the past several decades, development of the classical experimental techniques has already largely promoted the progress of lupus research. In the new century, even more new research techniques have been developed, they are genomics, metabolomics, single-cell sequencing technology, high-throughput sequencing, CyTOF mass and imaging mass cytometry, spatial transcriptome detection technology, DNA labeling technology etc. On the other hand, cell models and animal models have also been developed for studying lupus research in vivo and in vitro. However, the traditional protocol/method papers in text have their limitations for education of other investigators, fellows and students. This Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE) provides a new platform for more advanced research education with visual learning approach. On the other hand, the JoVE video method collection will help experts to increase the visibility of their work and disseminate their research to the research community. We believe the new method collection will greatly benefit the scientific community of lupus research. This in-depth sharing of knowledge and techniques will promote the progress of lupus research and facilitate the communication between researchers around the world. This method collection will highlight both traditional and emerging techniques, methods or protocols involving any research aspects about lupus investigation, which includes the following, and not limited to
- Animal models for lupus (for example, lupus nephritis, cutaneous lupus, neuropsychiatric SLE, etc.)
- Models of immune cells or any other cell types in lupus research
- Cellular or tissue imaging analysis
- Classical and new experimental methods
- Analysis methods of the above mentioned new cutting-edge or high-throughput advanced techniques
- Lupus biomarkers for clinical investigations and/or practice etc.
