Our Labs

Hai-Hui (Howard) Xue, M.D. & Ph.D., is a member of the Center for Discovery and Innovation.

Dr. Xue’s lab investigates transcriptional and epigenetic regulation of T cell development in the thymus, T cell activation and differentiation in response to pathogen infection and in tumor microenvironment. The Xue lab is also interested in intrinsic regulators of self-renewal of hematopoietic and leukemic stem cells. For key biological processes, they focus on cell fate specification, cell identity commitment, and functional plasticity. For key molecular processes, they emphasize intra-molecule structure-function delineation, regulatory complex fluidity, and dynamic network programming within specific cell context, and aim to extract core regulatory concepts conserved across different cell contexts. The Xue lab integrates genome-wide profiling of histone modification, chromatin accessibility and interactions with mouse genetics and comprehensive functional characterization to precisely connect molecule events with functional output. Their long-term goal is to harness molecular insights in immune cells to improve treatment of emerging infectious diseases and tumors.