Ya-Chen Liang, PhD

Dr. Liang’s long-term research goal seeks to decompose how genomes and sub-nuclear structures are functionally organized in cell nuclei while maintaining their flexibility to respond to biological cues during development and disease pathogenesis. She focuses on studying spatial regulations of gene clusters, which are widespread in genomes, but little is known about their inter-cluster and subnuclear organizations. Her research integrates state-of-the-art functional genomic, computational, and proteomic approaches to address long-standing questions at the intersection of topological chromatin states and spatial subnuclear protein scaffolds. *Dr. Liang’s lab is actively recruiting graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. Please email your C.V. to ya-chen.liang@med.usc.edu.

• Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan: Overseas Postdoctoral Program for Frontier Technologies, 2014-2016

• Accelerometer-measured physical activity, sedentary behavior, and incidence of macrovascular and microvascular events in individuals with type 2 diabetes mellitus and prediabetes. J Sport Health Sci. 2025 Dec; 14:100973.. View in PubMed
• Fibroblast bioelectric signaling drives hair growth. Cell. 2025 Sep 18; 188(19):5175-5193.e21.. View in PubMed
• Causal Associations of Insomnia With Chronic Kidney Diseases and Underlying Blood Proteins: An Observational and Mendelian Randomization Study. Mayo Clin Proc. 2025 Jul; 100(7):1127-1141.. View in PubMed
• Organizational principles of integumentary organs: Maximizing variations for effective adaptation. Dev Biol. 2025 06; 522:171-195.. View in PubMed
• Molecular insights into region-specific sexual dichromatism: Comparative transcriptome analysis of red cheek pigmentation in zebra finches. PLoS Genet. 2025 May; 21(5):e1011693.. View in PubMed
• Association of Cigarette Consumption and Mucosal Thickening in the Paranasal Sinuses on MRI. Int Dent J. 2025 Apr; 75(2):1058-1067.. View in PubMed
• Skin regional specification and higher-order HoxC regulation. Sci Adv. 2025 Mar 21; 11(12):eado2223.. View in PubMed
• MRI Detection of Unknown Primary Tumours in the Head and Neck: What Is the Expected Normal Asymmetry in the Size of the Palatine Tonsils? Diagnostics (Basel). 2025 Mar 20; 15(6).. View in PubMed
• Change in diffusion weighted imaging after induction chemotherapy outperforms RECIST guideline for long-term outcome prediction in advanced nasopharyngeal carcinoma. Cancer Imaging. 2025 Mar 12; 25(1):32.. View in PubMed
• Device-Measured Physical Activity, Sedentary Behaviour and Risk of Chronic Kidney Diseases Across Levels of Grip Strength. J Cachexia Sarcopenia Muscle. 2025 Feb; 16(1):e13726.. View in PubMed
• Association of blood cadmium and physical activity with mortality: A prospective cohort study. Ecotoxicol Environ Saf. 2025 Jan 15; 290:117541.. View in PubMed
• Myocardial blood flow mechanism of mental stress-induced myocardial ischemia in women with ANOCA. iScience. 2024 Dec 20; 27(12):111302.. View in PubMed
• Associations of accelerometer-measured sleep duration with incident cardiovascular disease and cardiovascular mortality. Sleep. 2024 11 08; 47(11).. View in PubMed
• Observational and genetic evidence disagree on the association between loneliness and risk of multiple diseases. Nat Hum Behav. 2024 Nov; 8(11):2209-2221.. View in PubMed
• Social Isolation, Loneliness, and Risk of Microvascular Complications Among Individuals With Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus. Am J Kidney Dis. 2024 Nov; 84(5):557-566.e1.. View in PubMed
• Evaluation of Changes in Social Isolation and Loneliness with Incident Cardiovascular Events and Mortality. J Epidemiol Glob Health. 2024 Sep; 14(3):962-973.. View in PubMed
• Associations between accelerometer-measured circadian rest-activity rhythm, brain structural and genetic mechanisms, and dementia. Psychiatry Clin Neurosci. 2024 Jul; 78(7):393-404.. View in PubMed
• Trajectories of social isolation and loneliness and the risk of incident type 2 diabetes mellitus across genetic risk score. Diabetes Metab. 2024 05; 50(3):101526.. View in PubMed
• Association of Disrupted Delta Wave Activity During Sleep With Long-Term Cardiovascular Disease and Mortality. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2024 Apr 30; 83(17):1671-1684.. View in PubMed
• Association of accelerometer-measured sleep duration and different intensities of physical activity with incident type 2 diabetes in a population-based cohort study. J Sport Health Sci. 2024 Mar; 13(2):222-232.. View in PubMed
• Childhood maltreatment, genetic risk, and subsequent risk of arrhythmias: a prospective cohort study. Eur J Psychotraumatol. 2024; 15(1):2366055.. View in PubMed
• Joint Associations of Device-Measured Sleep Duration and Efficiency With All-Cause and Cause-Specific Mortality: A Prospective Cohort Study of 90 398 UK Biobank Participants. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2023 08 27; 78(9):1717-1724.. View in PubMed
• Joint association of physical activity and sleep duration with risk of all-cause and cause-specific mortality: a population-based cohort study using accelerometry. Eur J Prev Cardiol. 2023 07 12; 30(9):832-843.. View in PubMed
• Association of Social Isolation and Loneliness With Incident Heart Failure in a Population-Based Cohort Study. JACC Heart Fail. 2023 03; 11(3):334-344.. View in PubMed
• Association between sleep duration and metabolic syndrome: linear and nonlinear Mendelian randomization analyses. J Transl Med. 2023 02 07; 21(1):90.. View in PubMed
• Social isolation, loneliness and subsequent risk of major adverse cardiovascular events among individuals with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Gen Psychiatr. 2023; 36(6):e101153.. View in PubMed
• Associations of Childhood Maltreatment and Genetic Risks With Incident Heart Failure in Later Life. J Am Heart Assoc. 2022 10 18; 11(20):e026536.. View in PubMed
• Regional specific differentiation of integumentary organs: SATB2 is involved in α- and β-keratin gene cluster switching in the chicken. Dev Dyn. 2022 09; 251(9):1490-1508.. View in PubMed
• Regional Specific Differentiation of Integumentary Organs: Regulation of Gene Clusters within the Avian Epidermal Differentiation Complex and Impacts of SATB2 Overexpression. Genes (Basel). 2021 08 23; 12(8).. View in PubMed
• Making region-specific integumentary organs in birds: evolution and modifications. Curr Opin Genet Dev. 2021 08; 69:103-111.. View in PubMed
• Symmetry breaking of tissue mechanics in wound induced hair follicle regeneration of laboratory and spiny mice. Nat Commun. 2021 05 10; 12(1):2595.. View in PubMed
• Folding Keratin Gene Clusters during Skin Regional Specification. Dev Cell. 2020 06 08; 53(5):561-576.e9.. View in PubMed
• Association Between Behavioral Dysexecutive Syndrome and the Health-Related Quality of Life Among Stroke Survivors. Front Psychiatry. 2020; 11:563930.. View in PubMed
• Instructive role of melanocytes during pigment pattern formation of the avian skin. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2019 04 02; 116(14):6884-6890.. View in PubMed
• STAT3 signalling pathway is implicated in keloid pathogenesis by preliminary transcriptome and open chromatin analyses. Exp Dermatol. 2019 04; 28(4):480-484.. View in PubMed
• Transcriptome analyses of reprogrammed feather / scale chimeric explants revealed co-expressed epithelial gene networks during organ specification. BMC Genomics. 2018 Oct 29; 19(1):780.. View in PubMed
• DNA Methylation as an Epigenetic Memory Keeper during Skin Development and Regeneration. In: Botchkarev, V., Millar, S. (eds) Epigenetic Regulation of Skin Development and Regeneration. Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine. 2018; 57–73.
• SUMO5, a Novel Poly-SUMO Isoform, Regulates PML Nuclear Bodies. Sci Rep. 2016 05 23; 6:26509.. View in PubMed
• PARP-2 regulates cell cycle-related genes through histone deacetylation and methylation independently of poly(ADP-ribosyl)ation. Biochem Biophys Res Commun. 2013 Feb 01; 431(1):58-64.. View in PubMed
• FKBPs in chromatin modification and cancer. Curr Opin Pharmacol. 2011 Aug; 11(4):301-7.. View in PubMed

• Chuong, Cheng-Ming
• Wu, Ping
• Widelitz, Randall
• McMahon, Andrew
• Farnham, Peggy
• An, Woojin
• Chai, Yang
• Warburton, David
• Chen, Chih
• Peters, Anne
• Jang, Yuri
• Dunton, Genevieve