Jiaoyang Jiang

The overarching goal of my research program is to understand the mechanisms and functions of protein glycosylation in biology and disease. We are especially interested in a unique type of protein glycosylation, termed O-GlcNAcylation, which dynamically regulates a wide variety of cellular processes (e.g., transcription, translation and signaling) in a similar manner as protein phosphorylation. Aberrant O-GlcNAcylation has been detected in diabetes and many other challenging diseases. However, the mechanism underlying the dynamic (dys)regulation of O-GlcNAcylation remains largely unknown. My research group has been active in developing innovative tools to characterize the functions of O-GlcNAc cycling enzymes (OGT and OGA), and designing new strategies to detect, quantify and manipulate the levels of this modification, promoting novel biomarker discovery and therapeutic interventions. In this application, I seek to apply my strong expertise in protein glycosylation and other types of protein modifications in accelerating mechanism investigation and drug development efforts to combat diabetes and related diseases.