Research

Pain is a multi-dimensional unpleasant experience that strongly affects daily life. To understand the neural mechanisms of pain, we will selectively label and manipulate specific group of target neurons via intersectional mouse genetic tools, and decipher the pain circuits by means of combined anatomical, optogenetic and behavioral approaches. We will also study the interaction of pain and body homeostasis. Our findings will provide new insights for the development of new pain medicines.

Biography

2001-2005 Nanjing Unniversity, Biotechnology, B.S.
2005-2012 Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, CAS, Developmental Biology, Ph.D.
2012-2019 Department of Neurobiology/Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School, Postdoctoral Fellow
2019- present The Brain Cognition and Brain Disease Institute of Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Principal Investigator

Selected publications

1. Pan H., Fatima M., Li A., Lee H., Cai W., Horwitz L., Hor C. C., Zaher N., Cin M., Slade H., Huang T., Xu X. Z. S., and Duan B. (2019) Identification of a Spinal Circuit for Mechanical and Persistent Spontaneous Itch. Neuron 103, 1135-1149

2. Huang, T.*, Lin, S. H.*, Malewicz, N. M., Zhang, Y., Zhang, Y., Goulding, M., LaMotte, R. H., and Ma, Q. (2019) Identifying the pathways required for coping behaviours associated with sustained pain. Nature 565, 86-90

3. Cheng, L.*, Duan, B.*, Huang, T.*, Zhang, Y., Chen, Y., Britz, O., Garcia-Campmany, L., Ren, X., Vong, L., Lowell, B. B., Goulding, M., Wang, Y., and Ma, Q. (2017) Identification of spinal circuits involved in touch-evoked dynamic mechanical pain. Nat Neurosci 20, 804-814

4. Huang, T.*, Hu, J.*, Wang, B., Nie, Y., Geng, J., and Cheng, L. (2013) Tlx3 controls cholinergic transmitter and peptide phenotypes in a subset of prenatal sympathetic neurons. J Neurosci 33,10667-10675

5. Hu, J.*, Huang, T.*, Li, T., Guo, Z., and Cheng, L. (2012) c-Maf is required for the development of dorsal horn laminae III/IV neurons and mechanoreceptive DRG axon projections. J Neurosci 32, 5362-5373

6. Huang, T.*, Liu, Y.*, Huang, M., Zhao, X., and Cheng, L. (2010) Wnt1-cre-mediated conditional loss of Dicer results in malformation of the midbrain and cerebellum and failure of neural crest and dopaminergic differentiation in mice. J Mol Cell Biol 2, 152-163

7. Huang, M., Huang, T., Xiang, Y., Xie, Z., Chen, Y., Yan, R., Xu, J., and Cheng, L. (2008) Ptf1a, Lbx1 and Pax2 coordinate glycinergic and peptidergic transmitter phenotypes in dorsal spinal inhibitory neurons. Dev Biol 322, 394-405 *Equal Contribution