Jia-Ching Shieh

(Associate Professor; Ph. D)

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Interests in Research

Jia-Ching Shieh is interested in how genetic, epigenetic, and environmental factors get involved in a variety of human diseases, which is in concert with the subjects of his teaching. His main research focuses presently addresses the mechanism underlying morphological plasticity, key to switch of commensalism-to-pathogenesis, of the opportunistic human fungal pathogen Candida albicans, which is significant in both biology and medicine. Unprecedentedly, his team found that C. albicans CDC4 (CaCDC4) and CDC7 (CaCDC7) suppress yeast-to-hypha transition, contrasting to their evolutionarily conserved roles in the G1-to-S transition and initiating DNA replication of the mitotic cell cycle, respectively. His studies revealed the cross-talk between morphogenesis and stress and nutrient responses, environmental cues, and the role of epigenetic regulation in morphological plasticity and are under further investigation using classical approaches of genetics, molecular biology, cell biology and biochemistry incorporated with the cutting edge technologies of functional genomics, proteomics, and epigenomics. Additionally, to overcome C. albicans being an incomplete sexual cycle diploid with a non-canonical codon usage, his team established novel platforms such as gene deletion, conditional gene expression, bimolecular fluorescence complementation (BiFC), and E. coli-based ubiquitination, which reinforce revealing unique genes involved in morphogenesis and other virulence-related genes and their functional analysis. These platforms are available and used by dozen of research teams at home and abroad
 

Publications (at most 7 publications in recent 5 years)

1. Lee YT, Fang YY, Sun YW, Hsu HC, Weng SM, Tseng TL, Lin TH, Shieh JC^ë (2018) THR1 mediates GCN4 and CDC4 to link morphogenesis with nutrient sensing and the stress response in Candida albicans. Int J Mol Med. 42(6):3193-3208. (*corresponding author)
2. Cheng CW, Yu JC, Hsieh YH, Liao WL, Shieh JC, Yao CC, Lee HJ, Chen PM, Wu PE, Shen CY (2018) Increased Cellular Levels of MicroRNA-9 and MicroRNA-221 Correlate with Cancer Stemness and Predict Poor Outcome in Human Breast Cancer. Cell Physiol Biochem. 48(5):2205-2218.
3. Tsai KD, Lee WX, Chen W, Chen BY, Chen KL, Hsiao TC, Wang SH, Lee YJ, Liang SY, Shieh JC, Lin TH (2018) Upregulation of PRMT6 by LPS suppresses Klotho expression through interaction with NF-κB in glomerular mesangial cells. J Cell Biochem. 119(4):3404-3416.
4. Liu SY, Huang CH, Shieh JC, Lee TL (2017) Cinnamomum osmophloeum Kanehira ethanol extracts prevents human liver-derived HepG2 cell death from oxidation stress by induction of ghrelin gene expression. J Biosci. 2017 Sep;42(3):439-448.
5. Shyu HY, Yen LR, Hsieh YH, Shieh JC, Wang HW, Cheng CW (2017) Association of eNOS and Cav-1 gene polymorphisms with susceptibility risk of large artery atherosclerotic stroke. PLoS ONE 12(3):e0174110.
6. Lai WC, Chang TW, Wu CH, Yang SY, Lee TL, Li WC, Chien T, Cheng YC, Shieh JC^ë (2016) Candida albicans Dbf4-dependent Cdc7 kinase plays a novel role in the inhibition of hyphal development. Scientific Reports 6:33716, 1-13. (*corresponding author)
7. Lai WC, Sun HFS, Lin H, Shieh JC^ë (2016) A new rapid and efficient system with dominant selection developed to inactivate and conditionally express genes in Candida albicans. Current Genetics 62 (1): 213-235. (*corresponding author)
8. Chien T, Tseng TL, Wang JY, Shen YT, Lin TH, Shieh JC^ë (2015) Candida albicans DBF4 gene inducibly duplicated by the mini-Ura-blaster is involved in hypha-suppression. Mutation Research - Fundamental and Molecular Mechanisms of Mutagenesis 779:78-85. (*corresponding author)
9. Tseng TL, Lai WC, Lee TL, Hsu WH, Sun YW, Li WC, Cheng CW, Shieh JC^ë (2015) A role of Candida albicans CDC4 in the negative regulation of biofilm formation. Canadian Journal of Microbiology 61(4):247-55. (*corresponding author)
10. Chin C, Lai WC, Lee TL, Tseng TL, Shieh JC^ë (2013). Dissection of the Candida albicans Cdc4 protein reveals the involvement of domains in morphogenesis and cell flocculation. Journal of Biomedical Science, 20(1):97, 1-11 (*corresponding author)