Welcome to Yansheng Liu Lab
Group picture 07/2024
Dr. Yansheng Liu
Associate Professor
Department of Pharmacology
Department of Biomedical Informatics & Data Science
Yale University School of Medicine
Institute Address:
Cancer Biology Institute
ABC 371C, 840 West Campus Drive,
PO Box 27400
West Haven, CT 06516
Tel: +1 (203)737-3853
Email: yansheng.liu@yale.edu
Dr. Yansheng Liu is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pharmacology and the Department of Biomedical Informatics & Data Science (BIDS) at Yale University School of Medicine. He is also a group leader in quantitative proteomics at the Yale Cancer Biology Institute and Yale Cancer Center. Dr. Liu received his Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2011 and completed his post-doctoral training at ETH Zurich under the mentorship of Ruedi Aebersold.
Since joining Yale's faculty in December 2017, Dr. Liu has focused his research on analyzing protein turnover and post-translational modifications to understand cancer aneuploidy, cellular signaling transduction, and biodiversity. His lab is further dedicated to advancing multiplexed data-independent acquisition mass spectrometry (DIA-MS) and recently harnessing MALDI imaging mass spectrometry (MALDI-MSI) based spatial omics techniques in clinical applications. Dr. Liu has been recognized with several prestigious awards, including the ASMS Research Award, the HUPO ECR Award, and the US HUPO Robert J. Cotter Award.
Dr. Liu is a member of the HUPO Awards Committee (since 2018), the HUPO Education and Training Committee (ETC, since 2022), and the US HUPO Advisory Board (since 2023). He also serves as an editor and advisory board member for four scientific journals, including Proteomics, Proteomics-Clinical Applications, Review Commons (EMBO), and The Innovation Life.
Dr. Wenxue Li
Associate Research Scientist
Wenxue Li completed his Ph.D. in February 2018 at the University of Fribourg School of Medicine, Switzerland. His Ph.D. research focused on the mass spectrometry-based analysis of neurodegenerative diseases, measurements of biochemical molecules including neuropeptides, and proteomics on extracellular vesicle-associated proteins in the central nervous system.
Wenxue started as a postdoc in Dr. Yansheng Liu's lab at the Yale Cancer Biology Institute in March 2018. He is working on data-independent acquisition (DIA) based proteomics and development of new mass spectrometry techniques such as MALDI imaging. His research focuses on proteome abundance and turnover profiling at translational and post-translational levels in cancer cells and disease processes. Wenxue was promoted to Associate Research Scientist in the Liu Lab in 2022.
Wenxue has already published >20 papers in the Liu Lab, including first and co-first author publications in Nature Communications, Science Advances, and other journals.
E-mail: wenxue.li@yale.edu
Dr. Yi Di
Associate Research Scientist
Yi Di received his Doctor’s degree in Chemical Biology from Fudan University, China, in 2019. His Ph.D. research focused on the development of multiplex data-independent acquisition (DIA) methods. Additionally, his research included the investigation of protein modifications, such as glycosylation, specifically sialylation.
Yi joined Dr. Liu's lab in the Department of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology Institute at Yale University as a Postdoctoral Fellow in July 2019. His research focuses on protein interactions, turnover, and the quantification of protein modifications (e.g. glycosylation) to better understand human diseases. Yi was recently promoted to Associate Research Scientist in the Liu Lab in 2024.
E-mail: yi.di@yale.edu
Dr. Barbora Salovska
Associate Research Scientist
Barbora Salovska completed her Ph.D. at the Faculty of Medicine of Charles University in Hradec Králové, Czech Republic, in 2017. Her Ph.D. research mainly focused on the phosphoproteomic analysis of signaling pathways triggered by ionizing radiation-induced DNA damage. As a postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of Dr. Jiri Bartek at the Institute of Molecular Genetics of the ASCR, v. v. i. in Prague, Czech Republic, she investigated the role of oxidative stress in ionizing radiation-induced cellular senescence using redox proteomics.
Following a six-month internship at YCBI in 2018-2019, Barbora joined Dr. Liu's lab as a postdoctoral associate in January 2021. Her research focuses on bioinformatic analysis and pipeline establishment for DIA proteomics and phosphoproteomics. Barbora has already published several first-author papers in the Liu Lab, including in Molecular Systems Biology (2020), Analytical Chemistry (2021), and Clinical and Translational Medicine (2023). She was promoted to Associate Research Scientist in the Liu Lab in 2023.
E-mail: barbora.salovska@yale.edu
Dr. Shuo Qian
Postdoctoral Researcher
Shuo Qian completed his Ph.D. degree in Cancer Sciences in June 2024 from Roswell Park Graduate Division, University at Buffalo, USA. His Ph.D. research focused on improving the quantification depth of mass spectrometry-based proteomics. Additionally, he developed and optimized data processing pipelines for various research scenarios, such as spatial proteomics and proteomics on patient-derived xenograft models.
Shuo joined Dr. Liu’s lab as a postdoctoral researcher in July 2024. His projects will involve the development of bioinformatic analysis in DIA-MS, spatial proteomics, and imaging mass spectrometry.
E-mail: shuo.qian@yale.edu
Delyar Khosroabadi
Ph.D. Student
Delyar Khosroabadi completed her undergraduate degree in Chemistry with a concentration in Biochemistry from California State University Channel Islands in May 2024. During her undergraduate studies, she investigated the intracellular mechanism and novel targets of serotonin using caenorhabditis elegans and also contributed to the design and synthesis of novel nucleoside analogues as potential chemotherapeutics for pancreatic cancer. She also participated in the NSF REU program at Vanderbilt University where she worked on mapping coronavirus nonstructural protein 2 regions involved in strain-specific interactions using quantitative mass spectrometry.
Delyar joined Dr. Liu’s lab as a graduate student in March 2025. Her project uses data-independent acquisition (DIA) based proteomics to explore biological questions regarding cancer aneuploidy and unique post-translational modifications of newly synthesized proteins.
E-mail: delyar.khosroabadi@yale.edu
Duo Zhang
Postgraduate Fellow
Duo Zhang is pursuing her Ph.D. at Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine in China. Her Ph.D. research focuses on exploring the pharmaceutical effect and underlying mechanism of bioactive compounds on diabetic nephropathy.
Duo began her postgraduate fellowship in Dr. Yansheng Liu’s lab at the Yale Cancer Biology Institute in May 2024. She is working on MALDI-imaging lipidomics/metabolomics. Her current research focuses on the metabolome and lipid abundance and profiling at single-cell levels and in disease processes.
E-mail: duo.zhang.dz383@yale.edu
Can Akpınaroğlu
Postgraduate Associate
Can Akpınaroğlu completed his M.Sc. degree in Molecular Medicine with a specialization in oncology at Universität Ulm, Germany, in December 2023. For his M.Sc. thesis project, he analyzed B-cell receptor signaling in chronic lymphocytic leukemia and monoclonal B-cell lymphocytosis. Simultaneously, during his M.Sc. education, he worked as a research assistant at Universitätsklinikum Ulm, which involved molecular biology and the use of animal models such as zebrafish, mice, and rats.
In July 2024, Can joined YSL Proteomics as a postgraduate research associate and is excited to explore the proteomics universe.
E-mail: can.akpnarolu@yale.edu
Qinyue (Susan) Wang
Master student
Qinyue Wang completed her undergraduate degree in Neuroscience and Behavior through the Dual BA Program at Trinity College Dublin and Columbia University in May 2024. She is now pursuing a Master of Public Health in Chronic Epidemiology of Disease at Yale Public Health. Her research initially focused on the role of sphingolipid metabolism in regulating mitochondrial transport and function in diabetic neuropathy. She then shifted her interest to investigating the role of PLPP3 in regulating LPA signaling in the aging kidney using tissue MALDI-mass spectrometry imaging.
In August 2024, Qinyue joined Yansheng Liu’s lab at the Yale Cancer Biology Institute as a master’s student research assistant.
E-mail: qinyue.wang@yale.edu
Jason Li
Undergraduate student
Jason Li is an undergraduate student at Yale College in the Class of 2028. He plans on majoring in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology in the premed track. He is interested in biomedical research and is eager to learn relevant skills.
In Jan 2025, Jason joined Yansheng Liu’s lab at the Yale Cancer Biology Institute as an undergraduate student research assistant.
E-mail: jason.li@yale.edu
Elaine Kupec
Sr. Administrative Assistant
P.O Box 27400, West Haven, CT 06516
300 Heffernan Drive, Bldg. 840
ABC Room 321
Office: 203-737-7965
Fax: 203-737-7335
E-mail: elaine.kupec@yale.edu
Pouyan Rahmani
Institute Coordinator for the Cancer Biology Institute
Research Associate 3, MS
E-mail: elaine.kupec@yale.edu
Alumni
Name; Position in the Liu Lab; Current Position
Chongde Wu; Visiting scholar (09/2018-03/2020); Professor, Sichuan University, Sichuan, China
Erli Gao; Lab Associate (06/2019-12/2020); Resident, The First Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Jiangsu, China
Pingfu Hou; Visiting scholar (11/2019-10/2020); Associate Professor, Xuzhou Medical University, Jiangsu, China
Qian Ba; Postdoc (09/2019-01/2021); Professor, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai, China
Zhenyi Hu; Postdoc (2022-2023); Professor, Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, Shanghai, China
Yuanyuan Hei; Postgraduate (09/2019-08/2020); Postdoctoral fellow, National University of Singapore, Singapore
Annie Shen; Visiting student (07/2022-08/2022); M.D. candidate at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, USA
Carlos Chacon Cordon; Visiting student (07/2022-08/2022); Postgraduate at Yale University School of Medicine, USA
Nezka Zupan; Visiting student (03/2023-07/2023); UCL Medical Physics & Bioengineering PhD candidate, UK