Dr. Lin Tian is a Principal Investigator at Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center (SYSUCC). Lin received his B.S. degree from Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 2011. In the same year, Lin was enrolled in the Biochemistry and Molecular Biologygraduateprogram at Baylor College of Medicine. After one-year rotation, Lin joined Dr. Xiang Zhang lab at Breast Center, where Lin focused on the interactions between different components of the tumor microenvironment. Using various transgenic mouse models with deficiencies in vessel structure or T cells, Lin uncovered that activation of the CD4+ T cells can remarkably improve the function and structure of the tumor vasculature, allowing for more efficient delivery of therapeutic agents to the tumor. Reciprocally, restoring the function and structure of tumor blood vessels to normal can also stimulate the immune system, thereby triggering a positive feedback loop between vessel normalization and immune stimulation (Nature, 2017).

After obtaining Ph.D degree, Lin joined Dr. Joan Massagué lab at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center as a Irvington Postdoctoral Fellow sponsored by Cancer Research Institute. During the post-doctoral training, Lin focused on the problem of brain metastasis of HER2+ breast cancer, a devastating disease pertinent to a poor response to HER2 targeted therapy. Lin created new experimental models to investigate brain metastasis, and uncovered that an over-representation of extracellular matrix deposition in HER2+ brain metastatic derivatives acts as a barrier to tumor infiltration by microglial immune surveillance (bioRxiv, 2023).

In 2020, Lin took the tenure-track faculty position at SYSUCC. The lab is investigating how the stromal cells exhibit phenotypic and functional plasticity in response to different microenvironmental milieu, developing more effective adjuvant therapies by targeting immune-suppressive microenvironment, and actively collaborating elite clinicians at SYSUCC to transfer basic research findings to treat cancer.

1. phenotypic and functional plasticity of tumor microenvironment

2. epigenetic reprogramming of stromal cells

Cancer Biology and Genetics Program, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Post-doctoral Scholar, 2017-2020

Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Department, Baylor College of Medicine, Ph.D. Student, 2011-2017

Biotechnology and Bioengineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, B.S., 2007-2011

1.Tian L, Goldstein A, Wang H, Lo HC, Kim IS, Welte T, Sheng K, Dobrolecki LE, Zhang X, Putluri N, Phung TL, Mani SA, Stossi F, Sreekumar A, Mancini MA, Decker WK, Zong C, Lewis MT, Zhang XH. 2017. Mutual regulation of tumour vessel normalization and immunostimulatory reprogramming. Nature. 544:250-254. 

2.Wang H, Tian L, Liu J, Goldstein A, Zhang W, Bado I, Li Z, Zhao H, Wong STC, Zhang XH. 2018. The osteogenic niche is a calcium reservoir of breast cancer bone micrometastases and confers unexpected therapeutic vulnerability. Cancer Cell.

3.Wang H, Tian L, Goldstein A, Liu J, Lo HC, Sheng K, Welte T, Wong STC, Gugala Z, Stossi F, Zong C, Li Z, Mancini MA, Zhang XH. 2017. Bone-in-culture array as a platform to model early-stage bone metastases and discover anti-metastasis therapies. Nature Communications. 8:15045. 

4.Basnet H, Tian L, Ganesh K, Huang YH, Macalinao DG, Brogi E, Finley L, Massagué J. 2018. Flura-seq identifies organ-specific metabolic adaptations during early metastatic colonization. Elife.