Dr. Heping Xu is currently serving as an Assistant Professor in the School of Life Sciences at Westlake University.  He obtained his Ph.D. from the Institute for Immunology at Tsinghua University in 2014. Following the completion of his doctoral studies, he pursued postdoctoral research training at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard from 2014 to 2019. In 2019, he joined Westlake University.

The broad research interests of the laboratory lie in the field of immunophysiology and systems immunology. Our long-term research goal is to gain a comprehensive understanding of the intricate communication networks between immune cells and tissue-specific microenvironments in both homeostatic and inflammatory conditions, with the ultimate objective to develop precision immunotherapies that can effectively treat chronic inflammatory disorders, such as allergy, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), and autoimmune diseases. Currently, the laboratory is focused on several specific research areas, including 1) meningeal B cell development and function, 2) antibody maturation and humoral immunity, and 3) the neuronal and metabolic control of immune cell activities in the mucosal tissues.

 (*co-first author, #co-corresponding author)

1. Xu, H., Li, X., Liu, D., Li, J., Zhang, X., Chen, X., Hou, S., Peng, L., Xu, C., Liu, W., Zhang, L. & Qi, H. Follicular T-helper cell recruitment governed by bystander B cells and ICOS-driven motility. Nature 496, 523-527 (2013).

2. Liu, D.^*, Xu, H.^*, Shih, C., Wan, Z., Ma, X., Ma, W., Luo, D. & Qi, H. T-B-cell entanglement and ICOSL-driven feed-forward regulation of germinal centre reaction. Nature 517, 214-218 (2015).

3. Xu, H., Chaudhri, V.K., Wu, Z., Biliouris, K., Dienger-Stambaugh, K., Rochman, Y. & Singh, H. Regulation of bifurcating B cell trajectories by mutual antagonism between transcription factors IRF4 and IRF8. Nature Immunology 16, 1274-1281 (2015).

4. Xu, H.^*#, Ding, J.^*, Porter, C.B.M., Wallrapp, A., Tabaka, M., Ma, S., Fu, S., Guo, X., Riesenfeld, S.J., Su, C., Dionne, D., Nguyen, L.T., Lefkovith, A., Ashenberg, O., Burkett, P.R., Shi, H.N., Rozenblatt-Rosen, O., Graham, D.B., Kuchroo, V.K., Regev, A.^# & Xavier, R.J.^# Transcriptional Atlas of Intestinal Immune Cells Reveals that Neuropeptide alpha-CGRP Modulates Group 2 Innate Lymphoid Cell Responses. Immunity 51, 696-708 e699 (2019).

5. Chen, D.^*, Wang, Y.^*, Manakkat Vijay, G.K.^*, Fu, S., Nash, C.W., Xu, D., He, D., Salomonis, N., Singh, H.^# & Xu, H.^# Coupled analysis of transcriptome and BCR mutations reveals role of OXPHOS in affinity maturation. Nature Immunology 22, 904-913 (2021).

6. Wang, Y.^*, Chen, D.^*, Xu, D.^*, Huang, C., Xing, R., He, D.^# & Xu, H.^# Early developing B cells undergo negative selection by central nervous system-specific antigens in the meninges. Immunity 54, 2784-2794 e2786 (2021).

7. Cao, Y.^*, Li, Y.^*, Wang, X., Liu, S., Zhang, Y., Liu, G., Ye, S., Zheng, Y., Zhao, J., Zhu, X., Chen, Y., Xu, H., Feng, D., Chen, D., Chen, L., Liu, W., Zhou, W., Zhang, Z., Zhou, P., Deng, K., Ye, L., Yu, Y., Yao, Z., Liu, Q., Xu, H.^# & Zhou, J.^# Dopamine inhibits group 2 innate lymphoid cell-driven allergic lung inflammation by dampening mitochondrial activity. Immunity 56, 320-335 e329 (2023).

8. Li, Y., Liu, S., Zhou, K., Wang, Y., Chen, Y., Hu, W., Li, S., Li, H., Wang, Y., Wang, Q., He, D. & Xu, H. Neuromedin U programs eosinophils to promote mucosal immunity of the small intestine. Science 381, 1189-1196 (2023).

9. Zang, Y., Liu, S., Rao, Z., Wang, Y., Zhang, B., Li, H., Cao, Y., Zhou, J., Shen, Z., Duan, S., He, D. & Xu, H. Retinoid X receptor gamma dictates the activation threshold of group 2 innate lymphoid cells and limits type 2 inflammation in the small intestine. Immunity (2023).