He Laboratory - Feinberg Labs

Welcome to the He Lab!

We aim to understand why intracellular quality control is important for metabolism and behaviors in health and disease, and how to therapeutically exert its optimal function to prevent and treat diseases. Our research projects are centered on intracellular quality control mediated by autophagy (“self-eating”), a lysosomal degradation pathway essential for nutrient recycling, cellular maintenance and physiological function. Autophagy is induced by stress conditions such as fasting and exercise, and allows cells to adapt to changing nutrient and energy demands through protein catabolism.

Our interest focuses on the roles and mechanisms of autophagy in the regulation of metabolism and in the pathogenesis of metabolic and neurological disorders, including obesity, type 2 diabetes, neurodegeneration, and drug abuse. Malfunction of autophagy is implicated in a variety of diseases, such as metabolic disorders, neurodegeneration, cancer, infection and aging; conversely, we have shown that upregulation of autophagy mediates exercise-induced metabolic benefits and protects Alzheimer’s mice from neurodegeneration. We are interested in demonstrating how the autophagy machinery recognizes various cargos and regulates their trafficking, degradation and secretion, including aggregate-prone proteins, secretory proteins and membrane receptors, in metabolic organs and in different neuronal cell types in the brain, and studying how such degradation leads to metabolic and behavioral alterations.

Announcements

Graduate students welcome for rotation!

Postdoctoral positions available!

News

06/2023 Congcong is promoted to tenured Associate Professor!

01/2023 Kenta's research article "Exercise-activated hepatic autophagy via the FN1-α5β1 integrin pathway drives metabolic benefits of exercise" is accepted by Cell Metabolism, and highlighted in Nature Reviews Endocrinology, Editors' Choice of Science Signaling, and Northwestern News. Congrats!

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12/2022 Pingdong joined the lab for postdoctoral training. Welcome!

10/2022 Kenta received the Best Poster Award at the 2022 Cell & Developmental Biology Retreat. Congrats!

09/2022 He Lab received a competitive renewal R01 from NIDDK to study the mechanism of autophagy activation in exercise-induced anti-diabetic benefits. 08/2022 He Lab received a 3rd R01 from NIDA to study the autophagic regulation of cocaine abuse.

08/2022 Jack joined the lab for doctoral graduate study (NUIN program). Welcome!

07/2022 Huancheng joined the lab as a technician. Welcome!

04/2022 Idalis joined the lab for doctoral graduate study (DGP program). Welcome!

03/2022 Deying joined the lab for postdoctoral training. Welcome!

09/2021 He Lab received a 2nd R01 from NIDDK to study autophagy-facilitated secretion in metabolic maintenance.

05/2021 Kenta's research article "The autophagy protein Becn1 improves insulin sensitivity by promoting adiponectin secretion via exocyst binding" is accepted by Cell Reports, and highlighted in Northwestern News. Congrats!

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02/2021 Yoon-Jin's research article titled "An autophagy-related protein Becn2 regulates cocaine reward behaviors in the dopaminergic system" is published in Science Advances, and highlighted in Northwestern News. Congrats!

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04/2020 Congcong was awarded a Lurie Cancer Center Translational Bridge Award to study autophagy in cancer cell metabolism.​

12/2019 Meng received an internship offer from Genentech. Congrats and good luck!

11/2019 Dongxue joined the lab. Welcome!

08/2019 Xuan joined the lab. Welcome!

01/2019 Tong joined the lab. Welcome!

01/2019 Biotechnology master student Meng joined the lab. Welcome!

06/2018 Our Cell Reports paper and a collaborating Nature paper are featured in Northwestern News.

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05/2018 Hongxue joined the lab. Welcome!

05/2018 Soh and Kenta's research article "Autophagy differentially regulates insulin production and insulin sensitivity" was accepted in Cell Reports. Congrats!

04/2018 Congcong was awarded an Alzheimer's Disease Research Grant from the BrightFocus Foundation.

03/2018 Yoon-Jin joined the lab. Welcome!

01/2018 Altea's exercise article was chosen from >1,000 articles to feature in the 2017 JoVE Annual Highlights! JoVE showcases one article from each month of the past year that represents an outstanding contribution to research.

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01/2018 Biotechnology master student Charlotte joined the lab. Welcome!

11/2017 Congcong starts to serve as the course director of Cell Biology (DGP 405). Any suggestions or questions welcome!

11/2017 He Lab was relocated to a larger and nicer space at Ward building 8-321.

09/2017 Congcong received an R01 award from NIDDK. Happy hour!

09/2017 Congcong was awarded the American Federation for Aging Research (AFAR) New Investigator Award in Alzheimer’s Disease.

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08/2017 Altea's paper “A Becn1 mutation mediates hyperactive autophagic sequestration of amyloid oligomers and improved cognition in Alzheimer's disease” was accepted by PLOS Genetics. Congrats!

08/2017 Kenta returned to the lab for further training on autophagy and metabolism. Welcome back!

07/2017 Congcong was awarded a Northwestern Alzheimer's Disease Center Pilot Award.

04/2017 Altea gave an excellent talk at the departmental GSPD seminar. Congrats!

03/2017 Altea's review "Regulation of exercise-induced autophagy in skeletal muscle" was accepted by Current Pathobiology Reports. Congrats!

10/2016 Yigang joined the lab. Welcome!

08/2016 Xianxiu, a visiting pre-doctoral student from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, joined the lab. Welcome!

08/2016 Altea's article "Activating autophagy by aerobic exercise in mice" was accepted by the Journal of Visualized Experiments. Congrats!

07/2016 Yuying's paper "Identification of natural products with neuronal and metabolic benefits through autophagy induction" was accepted by Autophagy. Congrats!

04/2016 Soh joined the lab. Welcome!

03/2016 Kenta and Nan's paper "Autophagy activation by novel inducers prevents BECN2-mediated drug tolerance to cannabinoids" was accepted by Autophagy (IF=11.75). Congrats!

08/2015 Nan joined the lab. Welcome!

07/2015 Kenta was offered a faculty position at Yamagata University in Japan. Congrats!

04/2015 Kenta gave an outstanding presentation at the departmental GSPD (Graduate student and postdoctoral fellow) seminar. Congrats!

04/2015 Congcong was highlighted in the Faculty Profile in the April issue of Breakthroughs, the monthly newsletter of Feinberg School of Medicine.

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02/2015 Altea's review "Emerging roles of autophagy in metabolism and metabolic disorders" was accepted by Frontiers in Biology. Congrats!

09/2014 Yuying joined the lab. Welcome!

06/2014 Congcong was invited to present at the 74th Annual Meeting of the American Diabetes Association.

05/2014 Weiran's paper was accepted by Autophagy. Congrats!

04/2014 Kenta joined the lab. Welcome!

01/2014 Altea joined the lab. Welcome!

09/2013 Weiran joined the lab. Welcome!

09/2013 Grand opening of the He lab!