Xuelei Lai is a professor and doctoral supervisor at the College of Life Science and Technology of Huazhong Agricultural University, and a researcher at the National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement and Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Wuhan, China. He graduated from the University of Groningen in the Netherlands with a Ph.D. in 2016. From 2016 to 2021, he was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Cambridge and the French National Centre for Scientific Research, respectively. He worked on plant temperature sensing and flower development, and published paper in major journals such as Nature Communications, Molecular Plant and PNAS, and was invited to write review articles in journals such as Molecular Plant and Current Opinion in Plant Biology.

His lab currently works on how rice plants (Oryza sativa) sense abiotic stress signals (with a particular interest in temperature stresses, including low, high, and elevated ambient temperature), with a goal to breed climate-resilient rice varieties for the ever-increasing population in the context of global climate change.

Academic positions:

2021-Present: Principal Investigator, National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Wuhan, China

2021-Present: Principal Investigator, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Wuhan, China

2021-Present: Full Professor, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China  

2017-2021: Postdoc, The French National Centre for Scientific Research (Francois Parcy and Chloe Zubieta laboratory), Grenoble, France

2016-2017: Postdoc, The Sainsbury Laboratory, University of Cambridge (Philip A. Wigge), Cambridge, UK

Education:

2013-2016: University of Groningen (Bauke W. Dijkstra laboratory), Groningen, The Netherlands, PhD in biochemistry and molecular biology

2009-2012: Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin, China, master’s in food science and technology

2005-2009: Changchun University of Technology, Changchun, Jilin, China, bachelor’s in food science and technology

Representative publications (* co-first author, # corresponding author):

Wang, H.*, Ye, T.*, Guo, Z., Yao, Y., Tu, H., Wang, P., Zhang, Y., Wang, Y., Li, X., Li, B., Xiong, H., Lai, X.#, Xiong, L.# (2024). A double-stranded RNA binding protein enhances drought resistance via protein phase separation in rice. Nature Communications, 15 (2514).

Lai, X.*, Vega-Leon, R.*, Hugouvieux, V.*#, Blanc-Mathieu, R. van der Wal, F., Lucas, J., Silva, C.S., Jourdain, A., Muino, J., Nanao, M.H., Immink, R., Kaufmann, K., Parcy, F., Smaczniak, C.#, Zubieta C.# (2021). The Intervening Domain Is Required For DNA-binding and Functional Identity of Plant MADS Transcription Factors. Nat. Commun. 12 (4760).

Lai, X.*, Blanc-Mathieu, R.*, GrandVuillemin L., Huang, Y., Stigliani, A., Lucas, J., Thévenon, E., Loue-Manifel, J., Turchi, L., Daher, H., Brun-Hernandez, E., Vachon, G., Latrasse, D., Benhamed, M., Dumas, R., Zubieta, C., and Parcy, F.# (2021). The LEAFY floral regulator displays pioneer transcription factor properties. Mol. Plant 14(5):829-837.

Lai, X.*, Stigliani, A.*, Lucas, J., Hugouvieux, V., Parcy, F.#, and Zubieta, C.# (2020). Genome-wide binding of SEPALLATA3 and AGAMOUS complexes determined by sequential DNA-affinity purification sequencing. Nucleic Acids Res. 48 (17), 9637–9648.

Silva, C.S.*#, Nayak, A.*, Lai, X.*, Hutin, S.#, Hugouvieux, V., Jung, J.-H., López-Vidriero, I., Franco-Zorrilla, J.M., Panigrahi, K.C.S., Nanao, M.H., Wigge, P.A., and Zubieta, C.,# (2020). Molecular mechanisms of Evening Complex activity in Arabidopsis. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 117 (12), 6901–6909.

Lai, X.*, Chahtane, H.*, Martin-Arevalillo, R., Zubieta, C., and Parcy, F.# (2020). Contrasted evolutionary trajectories of plant transcription factors. Curr. Opin. Plant Biol. 54, 101–107.

Lai, X.#, Stigliani, A., Vachon, G., Carles, C., Smaczniak, C., Zubieta, C., Kaufmann, K., and Parcy, F.# (2019). Building Transcription Factor Binding Site Models to Understand Gene Regulation in Plants. Mol. Plant 12 (6), 743–763.

Lai, X., Wichers, H.J., Soler‐Lopez, M.#, and Dijkstra, B.W.# (2017). Structure of Human Tyrosinase Related Protein 1 Reveals a Binuclear Zinc Active Site Important for Melanogenesis. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 56 (33), 9812–9815.

Other publications:

Li, W.*, Yan, J.*, Zhang, Y., Zhang, F., Guan, Z., Yao, Y., Chang, Y., Tu, H., Li, X., Wang, H., Xiong, H., Lai, X., Yin, P., Xiong, L#. (2023). Serine protease NAL1 exerts pleiotropic functions through degradation of TOPLESS-related corepressor in rice. Nat. Plants 9(7), 1130-1142.

Jung, J.-H.*, Barbosa, A.D.*, Hutin, S.*, Kumita, J.R., Gao, M., Derwort, D., Silva, C.S., Lai, X., Pierre, E., Geng, F., Kim, S.B., Baek, S., Zubieta, C., Jaeger, K.E., and Wigge, P.A.# (2020). A prion-like domain in ELF3 functions as a thermosensor in Arabidopsis. Nature 585, 256–260.

Ezer, D., Jung, J.-H., Lan, H., Biswas, S., Gregoire, L., Box, M.S., Charoensawan, V., Cortijo, S., Lai, X., Stöckle, D., Zubieta, C., Jaeger, K.E., and Wigge, P.A.# (2017). The evening complex coordinates environmental and endogenous signals in Arabidopsis. Nat. Plants 3, 17087.

Come and join us:

We are part of the National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement and the newly established Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, which are both among the most advanced and promising plant and crop research centers in China. Our lab is recruiting postdoc researchers (1-2), PhD students (1-2 per year) and master students (2-4 per year). We welcome motivated researchers and students who are interested in key words, e.g., climate change, temperature sensing, crop genetic improvement, transcription factor and cis-element interaction, to join us. We provide competitive salary, housing and state-of-the-art research facilities.

Contacts:

Email: xuelei_lai@mail.hzau.edu.cn

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Xuelei_Lai

Google scholar: https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=3NaY5wUAAAAJ&hl=en

ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Xu

Address:

B612, Rice temperature sensing group,

National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement,

Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University,

No.1, Shizishan Street, Hongshan District, Wuhan, Hubei Province, P.R.China