On June 7th 2017, cell biologist and member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Zhang Xuemin arrived at SUSTech to give a lecture on “Tumor occurrence and intervention” in the library 111 lecture hall. The event was overseen by Xiao Guozhi, director of the Department of Biology.

Zhang Xuemin is the director of the National Center for Biomedical Analysis, as well as the director of the Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences. He is mainly involved in the molecular mechanism of inflammation-induced tumors and their intervention. He is a member of the State Council’s Food Safety Committee and chief scientist in the national biomedical field as well as other major national research projects.

Zhang Xuemin addressed topics such as oncogene and tumor suppressor gene “mutation”, the causes of the tumor, tumor genome research and many other cutting-edge elements in the field. He said that the tumor genome “mutation” is not static, and the main direction of tumor research has three factors: carcinogenic factors, cancer process and cancer treatment. Considering that China’s top five cancer deaths are lung cancer, liver cancer, stomach cancer, esophageal cancer, colon cancer, and that Chinese cancer carcinogens mainly with food and breathing related, it is critical to understand better how to deal with these healthcare challenges.

He also expressed that for the tumor to occur there are two important conditions: genomic instability and inflammation caused by immune disorders. He cited liver cancer, lung cancer and other examples, indicating that many cancers are caused by inflammation caused by the tumor. Then, using his current study as an example, he talked about the relationship between macrophages and colorectal cancer, CUEDC2 in human colorectal cancer-related macrophages, knockout CUEDC2 macrophages caused by functional imbalance, small molecules ND01 inhibits NNK-induced lung cancer and other various other points.

The talk concluded with a questions-answer session during which the students enthusiastically asked their questions, and Zhang provided meticulous answers. Zhang Xuemin signed off the university guestbook in which he wrote, “I wish SUSTech the best in its early days of international life science research!”.