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Professor KIM, Jung 金鼎

Professor KIM, Jung 金鼎

  • BSc, MSc (Korea U), PhD (U of Minnesota)
  • Assistant Professor
L4-61, Laboratory Block, 21 Sassoon Road, Hong Kong
+852 3917 9261
+852 2885 9730
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HKU Scholars Hub
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  • Systemic tumor-host interactions
  • Paraneoplastic syndromes
  • Tumor-dependent stem cell dysregulation
  • Stress-induced blood-brain barrier damage
  • Assistant Professor, School of Biomedical Sciences, HKU (2022–Present)
  • Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California-Berkeley, CA, USA (2015-2022)

          Advisor: Dr. David Bilder

  •  PhD, University of Minnesota, MN, USA (2009–2015)

           Advisor: Dr. Thomas Neufeld

  •   MSc, Korea University, Seoul, South Korea (2007-2009)

            Advisor: Dr. YoungSik Lee

  •    BSc, Korea University, Seoul, South Korea (2000-2004)

The Jung Kim Lab seeks to answer the fundamental question in cancer biology: “How do tumors actually kill hosts?”. We mainly focus on the systemic effects of tumors caused by tumor-secreted cytokines or hormones. Tumors can disrupt host organs at a distance via systemic effects, also called paraneoplastic syndromes or paraneoplasias. Using powerful Drosophila models, we found that tumor-secreted cytokine, fly IL-6, disrupts the blood-brain barrier (BBB) in the brain leading to host death (Developmental Cell, 2021), and we are further investigating the following areas in the Jung Kim Lab:

1) Systemic effects of tumors on stem cell homeostasis in hosts

2) Cellular and molecular mechanisms of blood-brain barrier damage by systemic inflammation

3) Novel tumor-secreted factors regulating host morbidity and mortality

1.   Sze Hang Kwok, Y Liu, D Bilder, Jung Kim (2024) Paraneoplastic renal dysfunction in fly cancer models driven by inflammatory activation of stem cells. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) 121 (42), e2405860121

2.   TC Hsi, K Ong, JJ Sepers, Jung Kim, D Bilder (2023) Systemic coagulopathy drives host lethality in a new Drosophila tumor model. Current Biology 33 (14), 3002-3010. e6

​3.   Jung Kim, HC Chuang, NK Wolf, CJ Nicolai, DH Raulet, K Saijo, D Bilder (2021) Tumor-induced disruption of the blood-brain barrier promotes host death. Developmental Cell 56 (19), 2712-2721. e4

​4.   D Bilder, K Ong, TC Hsi, K Adiga, Jung Kim (2021) Tumour–host interactions through the lens of Drosophila. Nature Reviews Cancer 21 (11), 687-700

​5.   Jung Kim, D Bilder, TP Neufeld (2018) Mechanical stress regulates insulin sensitivity through integrin-dependent control of insulin receptor localization. Genes & Development 32 (2), 156-164

6.   Jung Kim, TP Neufeld (2015) Dietary sugar promotes systemic TOR activation in Drosophila through AKH-dependent selective secretion of Dilp3. Nature Communications 6 (1), 1-10

 

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