Yue Xu, PhD

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I am an Instructor at Baylor College of Medicine since October 2025 and completed my UHN-PRiME postdoctoral fellowship in Bowen Li’s lab at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Toronto. I was trained in medicinal chemistry, earning a Ph.D. from China Pharmaceutical University, and during my postdoctoral training I brought a computational perspective to experimental science, developing predictive models and analyses to guide synthesis and biological testing. My current work focuses on building a high-throughput screening platform using rational design to evaluate lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) for mRNA delivery.

selected publications

  1. PNAS
    Rational design and modular synthesis of biodegradable ionizable lipids via the Passerini reaction for mRNA delivery
    Yue Xu, Fanglin Gong, Alex Golubovic, Amy Strilchuk, Jingan Chen, Muye Zhou, Songtao Dong, Breanna Seto, and Bowen Li
    Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2025
  2. Nat. Commun.
    AGILE platform: a deep learning powered approach to accelerate LNP development for mRNA delivery
    Yue Xu, Shihao Ma, Haotian Cui, Jingan Chen, Shufen Xu, Fanglin Gong, Alex Golubovic, Muye Zhou, Kevin Chang Wang, Andrew Varley, and others
    Nature communications, 2024
  3. Adv. Mater.
    Tumor-tailored ionizable lipid nanoparticles facilitate IL-12 circular RNA delivery for enhanced lung cancer immunotherapy
    Shufen Xu, Yue Xu, Nicholas C Solek, Jingan Chen, Fanglin Gong, Andrew James Varley, Alex Golubovic, Anni Pan, Songtao Dong, Gang Zheng, and others
    Advanced Materials, 2024
  4. J. Mater. Chem. B
    Rational design and combinatorial chemistry of ionizable lipids for RNA delivery
    Yue Xu, Alex Golubovic, Shufen Xu, Anni Pan, and Bowen Li
    Journal of Materials Chemistry B, 2023
  5. Nat. Biomed. Eng.
    Enhancing the immunogenicity of lipid-nanoparticle mRNA vaccines by adjuvanting the ionizable lipid and the mRNA
    Bowen Li, Allen Yujie Jiang, Idris Raji, Caroline Atyeo, Theresa M Raimondo, Akiva GR Gordon, Luke H Rhym, Tahoura Samad, Corina MacIsaac, Jacob Witten, and others
    Nature Biomedical Engineering, 2023
  6. PNAS
    Combinatorial design of ionizable lipid nanoparticles for muscle-selective mRNA delivery with minimized off-target effects
    Jingan Chen, Yue Xu, Muye Zhou, Shufen Xu, Andrew James Varley, Alex Golubovic, Rick Xing Ze Lu, Kevin Chang Wang, Mina Yeganeh, Daniel Vosoughi, and others
    Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2023
  7. ACS Sens.
    β-Lactamase-responsive probe for efficient photodynamic therapy of drug-resistant bacterial infection
    Yue Xu, Haiyan Chen, Shufen Xu, Ji Liu, Yang Chen, Lijuan Gui, Hua Li, Ruixi Li, Zhenwei Yuan, and Bowen Li
    Acs Sensors, 2022
  8. J. Adv. Res.
    Development of photosensitizer-loaded lipid droplets for photothermal therapy based on thiophene analogs
    Yue Xu, Hua Li, Lixue Fan, Yisha Chen, Li Li, Xiaojing Zhou, Ruixi Li, Yuru Cheng, Haiyan Chen, and Zhenwei Yuan
    Journal of advanced research, 2021
  9. J. Med. Chem.
    Light-triggered fluorescence self-reporting nitric oxide release from coumarin analogues for accelerating wound healing and synergistic antimicrobial applications
    Yue Xu, Hua Li, Shufen Xu, Xian Liu, Jingjing Lin, Haiyan Chen, and Zhenwei Yuan
    Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, 2021
  10. Anal. Chim. Acta
    A family of push-pull bio-probes for tracking lipid droplets in living cells with the detection of heterogeneity and polarity
    Li Li, Yue Xu, Yisha Chen, Jinrong Zheng, Juanjuan Zhang, Ruixi Li, Hao Wan, Jun Yin, Zhenwei Yuan, and Haiyan Chen
    Analytica Chimica Acta, 2020
  11. Talanta
    A visible and near-infrared, dual emission fluorescent probe based on thiol reactivity for selectively tracking mitochondrial glutathione in vitro
    Yue Xu, Ruixi Li, Xiaojing Zhou, Weiqing Li, Umeorah Ernest, Hao Wan, Li Li, Haiyan Chen, and Zhenwei Yuan
    Talanta, 2019