Catching Up with Jingxin Wang, Ph.D., past Frontiers Pilot Awardee
By Kelly Hale, Communications Coordinator
Jul 10, 2023
Jingxin Wang’s Pilot project was titled the “Down-regulation of Interferon Signaling by Splicing Modulators,” where he developed molecules that can precisely “turn off” protein production by manipulating a fundamental biological process in all human cells called mRNA splicing. Sometimes over-producing proteins would lead to severe diseases. For example, the existence of unnecessary pro-inflammatory proteins can over-activate our immune system and cause autoimmune diseases, such as lupus. Wang has studied how stopping inflammation by “turning off” these pro-inflammatory proteins in the signaling pathways could be a way to treat autoimmune diseases.
“Currently it takes more than 10 years for a drug treatment or therapy to get from an idea to market and billions of dollars. With this study, our hope is that we can reduce that time to get a safe and effective drug to market,” Wang said.
Wang and his team have used drug-like molecules to target a key gene in inflammation called the STAT1 gene. By joining the sequences together, the team hopes to not only develop an effective drug therapy but reduce the time it takes to get the drug to market to impact health outcomes.