Newman Sze, PhD

Professor, Health Sciences
Canada Research Chair in Mechanisms of Health and Disease

Newman Sze

905 688 5550 x6098
nsze@brocku.ca

Google Scholar

The goal of my research program is to answer one of the biggest fundamental questions in life science: What causes human aging? In addition to answering this key question, we also aim to understand why aging is the primary risk factor for human chronic diseases. The degenerative protein modifications (DPMs) occur via spontaneous protein modifications (e.g., oxidation, deamidation, glycation) have long been recognized as important mediators of human aging, but the underlying mechanisms by which they impair tissue and organ function have remained elusive. This is largely due to the current technical challenges of performing systems-wide analysis of progressive molecular damage in complex human bio samples. My laboratory is therefore focused on developing advanced ‘omics approach to elucidating DPM-biology in health and diseases, generating DPM-specific mAb to investigating functional consequences of DPMs accumulation in tissues, and targeting DPM to advancing immunotherapy for age-linked diseases. The ultimate aim of our research is to develop novel therapeutic and prophylactic approaches to combat the healthcare burden of age-related chronic diseases affecting the aging global population. 

Research Interests

  • Developing new approaches to elucidating molecular mechanisms of health and disease.
  • Understanding degenerative protein modifications as molecular mediators of biological aging.
  • Advancing immunotherapy for cardiovascular disease by targeting isoDGR-modified proteins.
  • Identifying new drug targets for cancer therapy and tumour prevention.
  • Defining molecular mediators underpinning early asymptomatic neurodegeneration. 

Professional affiliations and accreditation/certification

  • American Heart Association
  • International Society of Vascular Behavioural and Cognitive Disorders
  • American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
  • American Society for Mass Spectrometry (ASMS)
  • American Chemical Society 

Teaching

  • Development of therapeutic antibodies for human diseases.  
  • From target discovery to diagnostics and therapy of disease. 

Publications

  1. 1. Vinaiphat, A., Pazhanchamy, K., JebaMercy, G., Ngan, S. C., Leow, M. K.-S., Ho, H. H., Gao, Y.-G., Lim, K. L., Richards, A. M., Kleijn, D. P. V. d., Chen, C. P., Kalaria, R. N., Liu, J., O’Leary, D. D., McCarthy, N. E. & Sze, S. K. Endothelial Damage Arising From High Salt Hypertension Is Elucidated by Vascular Bed Systematic Profiling. Arteriosclerosis, thrombosis, and vascular biology, In press, doi:10.1161/ATVBAHA.122.318439 (2023).2. Thuya, W. L., Kong, L. R., Syn, N. L., Ding, L. W., Cheow, E. S. H., Wong, R. T. X., Wang, T., Goh, R. M. W., Song, H., Jayasinghe, M. K., Le, M. T., Hu, J. C., Yong, W. P., Lee, S. C., Wong, A. L., Sethi, G., Hung, H. T., Ho, P. C., Thiery, J. P., Sze, S. K., Guo, T., Soo, R. A., Yang, H., Lim, Y. C., Wang, L. & Goh, B. C. FAM3C in circulating tumor-derived extracellular vesicles promotes non-small cell lung cancer growth in secondary sites. Theranostics 13, 621-638, doi:10.7150/thno.72297 (2023).3. Viegas, J. O., Azad, G. K., Lv, Y., Fishman, L., Paltiel, T., Pattabiraman, S., Park, J. E., Kaganovich, D., Sze, S. K., Rabani, M., Esteban, M. A. & Meshorer, E. RNA degradation eliminates developmental transcripts during murine embryonic stem cell differentiation via CAPRIN1-XRN2. Developmental cell 57, 2731-2744.e2735, doi:10.1016/j.devcel.2022.11.014 (2022).4. Ngan, S. C., McCarthy, N. E. & Sze, S. K. pSILAC-Based Determination of Cellular Protein Sorting into Extracellular Vesicles. Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.) 2603, 43-58, doi:10.1007/978-1-0716-2863-8_4 (2023).5. Datta, A., Chen, C., Gao, Y. G. & Sze, S. K. Quantitative Proteomics of Medium-Sized Extracellular Vesicle-Enriched Plasma of Lacunar Infarction for the Discovery of Prognostic Biomarkers. International journal of molecular sciences 23, doi:10.3390/ijms231911670 (2022).

    6. Vinaiphat, A. & Sze, S. K. Proteomics for comprehensive characterization of extracellular vesicles in neurodegenerative disease. Experimental neurology 355, 114149, doi:10.1016/j.expneurol.2022.114149 (2022).

    7. Iyer, U. B., Park, J. E., Sze, S. K., Bozdech, Z. & Featherstone, M. Mediator Complex of the Malaria Parasite Plasmodium falciparum Associates with Evolutionarily Novel Subunits. ACS omega 7, 14867-14874, doi:10.1021/acsomega.2c00368 (2022).

    8. Hemu, X., Zhang, X., Nguyen, G. K. T., To, J., Serra, A., Loo, S., Sze, S. K., Liu, C. F. & Tam, J. P. Characterization and application of natural and recombinant butelase-1 to improve industrial enzymes by end-to-end circularization. RSC advances 11, 23105-23112, doi:10.1039/d1ra03763c (2021).

    9. Fazil, M., Prasannan, P., Wong, B. H. S., Kottaiswamy, A., Salim, N., Sze, S. K. & Verma, N. K. GSK3β Interacts With CRMP2 and Notch1 and Controls T-Cell Motility. Frontiers in immunology 12, 680071, doi:10.3389/fimmu.2021.680071 (2021).

    10. Fazil, M., Chirumamilla, C. S., Perez-Novo, C., Wong, B. H. S., Kumar, S., Sze, S. K., Vanden Berghe, W. & Verma, N. K. The steroidal lactone withaferin A impedes T-cell motility by inhibiting the kinase ZAP70 and subsequent kinome signaling. The Journal of biological chemistry 297, 101377, doi:10.1016/j.jbc.2021.101377 (2021).

    11. Liew, H. T., To, J., Zhang, X., Hemu, X., Chan, N. Y., Serra, A., Sze, S. K., Liu, C. F. & Tam, J. P. The legumain McPAL1 from Momordica cochinchinensis is a highly stable Asx-specific splicing enzyme. The Journal of biological chemistry 297, 101325, doi:10.1016/j.jbc.2021.101325 (2021).

    12. Gong, C., Krupka, J. A., Gao, J., Grigoropoulos, N. F., Giotopoulos, G., Asby, R., Screen, M., Usheva, Z., Cucco, F., Barrans, S., Painter, D., Zaini, N. B. M., Haupl, B., Bornelöv, S., Ruiz De Los Mozos, I., Meng, W., Zhou, P., Blain, A. E., Forde, S., Matthews, J., Khim Tan, M. G., Burke, G. A. A., Sze, S. K., Beer, P., Burton, C., Campbell, P., Rand, V., Turner, S. D., Ule, J., Roman, E., Tooze, R., Oellerich, T., Huntly, B. J., Turner, M., Du, M. Q., Samarajiwa, S. A. & Hodson, D. J. Sequential inverse dysregulation of the RNA helicases DDX3X and DDX3Y facilitates MYC-driven lymphomagenesis. Molecular cell 81, 4059-4075.e4011, doi:10.1016/j.molcel.2021.07.041 (2021).

    13. Goh, K. J., Ero, R., Yan, X. F., Park, J. E., Kundukad, B., Zheng, J., Sze, S. K. & Gao, Y. G. Translational GTPase BipA Is Involved in the Maturation of a Large Subunit of Bacterial Ribosome at Suboptimal Temperature. Frontiers in microbiology 12, 686049, doi:10.3389/fmicb.2021.686049 (2021).

    14. Koh, Y. Q., Ng, D. Q., Ng, C. C., Boey, A., Wei, M., Sze, S. K., Ho, H. K., Acharya, M., Limoli, C. L. & Chan, A. Extracellular Vesicle Proteome of Breast Cancer Patients with and Without Cognitive Impairment Following Anthracycline-based Chemotherapy: An Exploratory Study. Biomarker insights 16, 11772719211018204, doi:10.1177/11772719211018204 (2021).

    15. Lim, Z. Q., Ng, Q. Y., Oo, Y., Chu, J. J. H., Ng, S. Y., Sze, S. K. & Alonso, S. Enterovirus-A71 exploits peripherin and Rac1 to invade the central nervous system. EMBO reports 22, e51777, doi:10.15252/embr.202051777 (2021).

    16. Park, J. E., JebaMercy, G., Pazhanchamy, K., Guo, X., Ngan, S. C., Liou, K. C. K., Lynn, S. E., Ng, S. S., Meng, W., Lim, S. C., Leow, M. K., Richards, A. M., Pennington, D. J., de Kleijn, D. P. V., Sorokin, V., Ho, H. H., McCarthy, N. E. & Sze, S. K. Aging-induced isoDGR-modified fibronectin activates monocytic and endothelial cells to promote atherosclerosis. Atherosclerosis 324, 58-68, doi:10.1016/j.atherosclerosis.2021.03.020 (2021).

    17. Ngan, J. Y. G., Pasunooti, S., Tse, W., Meng, W., Ngan, S. F. C., Jia, H., Lin, J. Q., Ng, S. W., Jaafa, M. T., Cho, S. L. S., Lim, J., Koh, H. Q. V., Abdul Ghani, N., Pethe, K., Sze, S. K., Lescar, J. & Alonso, S. HflX is a GTPase that controls hypoxia-induced replication arrest in slow-growing mycobacteria. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 118, doi:10.1073/pnas.2006717118 (2021).

    18. Vinaiphat, A., Low, J. K., Yeoh, K. W., Chng, W. J. & Sze, S. K. Application of Advanced Mass Spectrometry-Based Proteomics to Study Hypoxia Driven Cancer Progression. Frontiers in oncology 11, 559822, doi:10.3389/fonc.2021.559822 (2021).

    19. Sze, S. K. Neonatal Renal Tumors. Clinics in perinatology 48, 71-81, doi:10.1016/j.clp.2020.11.004 (2021).

    20. Harikumar, A., Lim, P. S. L., Nissim-Rafinia, M., Park, J. E., Sze, S. K. & Meshorer, E. Embryonic Stem Cell Differentiation Is Regulated by SET through Interactions with p53 and β-Catenin. Stem cell reports 15, 1260-1274, doi:10.1016/j.stemcr.2020.11.004 (2020).

    21. Gallart-Palau, X., Serra, A. & Sze, S. K. System-wide molecular dynamics of endothelial dysfunction in Gram-negative sepsis. BMC biology 18, 175, doi:10.1186/s12915-020-00914-0 (2020).

    22. Pattabiraman, S., Azad, G. K., Amen, T., Brielle, S., Park, J. E., Sze, S. K., Meshorer, E. & Kaganovich, D. Vimentin protects differentiating stem cells from stress. Scientific reports 10, 19525, doi:10.1038/s41598-020-76076-4 (2020).

    23. Ngan, S. F. C. & Sze, S. K. Proteomic Profiling of the Secretome of Trichoderma reesei. Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.) 2234, 237-249, doi:10.1007/978-1-0716-1048-0_17 (2021).

    24. Tse, S. W., Tan, C. F., Park, J. E., Gnanasekaran, J., Gupta, N., Low, J. K., Yeoh, K. W., Chng, W. J., Tay, C. Y., McCarthy, N. E., Lim, S. K. & Sze, S. K. Microenvironmental Hypoxia Induces Dynamic Changes in Lung Cancer Synthesis and Secretion of Extracellular Vesicles. Cancers 12, doi:10.3390/cancers12102917 (2020).

    25. Sheriff, O., Yaw, A., Lai, S. K., Loo, H. L., Sze, S. K. & Preiser, P. R. Plasmodium falciparum replication factor C subunit 1 is involved in genotoxic stress response. Cellular microbiology 23, e13277, doi:10.1111/cmi.13277 (2021).

    26. Bu, W., Levitskaya, Z., Loh, Z. Y., Jin, S., Basu, S., Ero, R., Yan, X., Wang, M., Ngan, S. F. C., Sze, S. K., Tan, S. M. & Gao, Y. G. Structural basis of human full-length kindlin-3 homotrimer in an auto-inhibited state. PLoS biology 18, e3000755, doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.3000755 (2020).

    27. Ng, S. S., Park, J. E., Meng, W., Chen, C. P., Kalaria, R. N., McCarthy, N. E. & Sze, S. K. Pulsed SILAM Reveals In Vivo Dynamics of Murine Brain Protein Translation. ACS omega 5, 13528-13540, doi:10.1021/acsomega.9b04439 (2020).

    28. Wong, C. F., Lau, A. M., Harikishore, A., Saw, W. G., Shin, J., Ragunathan, P., Bhushan, S., Ngan, S. C., Sze, S. K., Bates, R. W., Dick, T. & Grüber, G. A systematic assessment of mycobacterial F(1) -ATPase subunit ε’s role in latent ATPase hydrolysis. The FEBS journal 288, 818-836, doi:10.1111/febs.15440 (2021).

    29. Tan, C. F., Teo, H. S., Park, J. E., Dutta, B., Tse, S. W., Leow, M. K., Wahli, W. & Sze, S. K. Exploring Extracellular Vesicles Biogenesis in Hypothalamic Cells through a Heavy Isotope Pulse/Trace Proteomic Approach. Cells 9, doi:10.3390/cells9051320 (2020).

    30. Vinaiphat, A. & Sze, S. K. Advances in extracellular vesicles analysis. Advances in clinical chemistry 97, 73-116, doi:10.1016/bs.acc.2019.12.003 (2020).

    31. Sze, S. K., JebaMercy, G. & Ngan, S. C. Profiling the ‘deamidome’ of complex biosamples using mixed-mode chromatography-coupled tandem mass spectrometry. Methods (San Diego, Calif.) 200, 31-41, doi:10.1016/j.ymeth.2020.05.005 (2022).

    32. Gallart-Palau, X., Guo, X., Serra, A. & Sze, S. K. Alzheimer’s disease progression characterized by alterations in the molecular profiles and biogenesis of brain extracellular vesicles. Alzheimer’s research & therapy 12, 54, doi:10.1186/s13195-020-00623-4 (2020).

    33. Koh, Y. Q., Tan, C. J., Toh, Y. L., Sze, S. K., Ho, H. K., Limoli, C. L. & Chan, A. Role of Exosomes in Cancer-Related Cognitive Impairment. International journal of molecular sciences 21, doi:10.3390/ijms21082755 (2020).

    34. Paramasivan, S., Adav, S. S., Ngan, S. C., Dalan, R., Leow, M. K., Ho, H. H. & Sze, S. K. Serum albumin cysteine trioxidation is a potential oxidative stress biomarker of type 2 diabetes mellitus. Scientific reports 10, 6475, doi:10.1038/s41598-020-62341-z (2020).

    35. Adav, S. S. & Sze, S. K. Hypoxia-Induced Degenerative Protein Modifications Associated with Aging and Age-Associated Disorders. Aging and disease 11, 341-364, doi:10.14336/ad.2019.0604 (2020).

    36. Guo, X., Park, J. E., Gallart-Palau, X. & Sze, S. K. Oxidative Damage to the TCA Cycle Enzyme MDH1 Dysregulates Bioenergetic Enzymatic Activity in the Aged Murine Brain. Journal of proteome research 19, 1706-1717, doi:10.1021/acs.jproteome.9b00861 (2020).

    37. He, Q., Toh, J. D., Ero, R., Qiao, Z., Kumar, V., Serra, A., Tan, J., Sze, S. K. & Gao, Y. G. The unusual di-domain structure of Dunaliella salina glycerol-3-phosphate dehydrogenase enables direct conversion of dihydroxyacetone phosphate to glycerol. The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology 102, 153-164, doi:10.1111/tpj.14619 (2020).

    38. Kam, A., Loo, S., Fan, J. S., Sze, S. K., Yang, D. & Tam, J. P. Roseltide rT7 is a disulfide-rich, anionic, and cell-penetrating peptide that inhibits proteasomal degradation. The Journal of biological chemistry 294, 19604-19615, doi:10.1074/jbc.RA119.010796 (2019).

    39. Gupta, N., Park, J. E., Tse, W., Low, J. K., Kon, O. L., McCarthy, N. & Sze, S. K. ERO1α promotes hypoxic tumor progression and is associated with poor prognosis in pancreatic cancer. Oncotarget 10, 5970-5982, doi:10.18632/oncotarget.27235 (2019).

    40. Serra, A., Gallart-Palau, X., Koh, W. Y., Chua, Z. J. Y., Guo, X., Chow, C. J. J., Chen, W. M., Park, J. E., Li, T., Tam, J. P. & Sze, S. K. Prooxidant modifications in the cryptome of beef jerky, the deleterious post-digestion composition of processed meat snacks. Food research international (Ottawa, Ont.) 125, 108569, doi:10.1016/j.foodres.2019.108569 (2019).

    41. Yang, H., Cheam, N. M. J., Cao, H., Lee, M. K. H., Sze, S. K., Tan, N. S. & Tay, C. Y. Materials Stiffness-Dependent Redox Metabolic Reprogramming of Mesenchymal Stem Cells for Secretome-Based Therapeutic Angiogenesis. Advanced healthcare materials 8, e1900929, doi:10.1002/adhm.201900929 (2019).

    42. Kannaian, B., Sharma, B., Phillips, M., Chowdhury, A., Manimekalai, M. S. S., Adav, S. S., Ng, J. T. Y., Kumar, A., Lim, S., Mu, Y., Sze, S. K., Grüber, G. & Pervushin, K. Abundant neuroprotective chaperone Lipocalin-type prostaglandin D synthase (L-PGDS) disassembles the Amyloid-β fibrils. Scientific reports 9, 12579, doi:10.1038/s41598-019-48819-5 (2019).

    43. Dembele, L., Gupta, D. K., Dutta, B., Chua, A. C. Y., Sze, S. K. & Bifani, P. Quantitative Proteomic Analysis of Simian Primary Hepatocytes Reveals Candidate Molecular Markers for Permissiveness to Relapsing Malaria Plasmodium cynomolgi. Proteomics 19, e1900021, doi:10.1002/pmic.201900021 (2019).

    44. Vinaiphat, A. & Sze, S. K. Clinical implications of extracellular vesicles in neurodegenerative diseases. Expert review of molecular diagnostics 19, 813-824, doi:10.1080/14737159.2019.1657407 (2019).

    45. Sun, L., Verma, S., Michael, N., Chan, S. P., Yan, J., Sadananthan, S. A., Camps, S. G., Goh, H. J., Govindharajulu, P., Totman, J., Townsend, D., Goh, J. P., Sun, L., Boehm, B. O., Lim, S. C., Sze, S. K., Henry, C. J., Hu, H. H., Velan, S. S. & Leow, M. K. Brown Adipose Tissue: Multimodality Evaluation by PET, MRI, Infrared Thermography, and Whole-Body Calorimetry (TACTICAL-II). Obesity (Silver Spring, Md.) 27, 1434-1442, doi:10.1002/oby.22560 (2019).

    46. Krishna, S., Yim, D. G., Lakshmanan, V., Tirumalai, V., Koh, J. L., Park, J. E., Cheong, J. K., Low, J. L., Lim, M. J., Sze, S. K., Shivaprasad, P., Gulyani, A., Raghavan, S., Palakodeti, D. & DasGupta, R. Dynamic expression of tRNA-derived small RNAs define cellular states. EMBO reports 20, e47789, doi:10.15252/embr.201947789 (2019).

    47. Hemu, X., El Sahili, A., Hu, S., Wong, K., Chen, Y., Wong, Y. H., Zhang, X., Serra, A., Goh, B. C., Darwis, D. A., Chen, M. W., Sze, S. K., Liu, C. F., Lescar, J. & Tam, J. P. Structural determinants for peptide-bond formation by asparaginyl ligases. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 116, 11737-11746, doi:10.1073/pnas.1818568116 (2019).

    48. Gallart-Palau, X., Tan, L. M., Serra, A., Gao, Y., Ho, H. H., Richards, A. M., Kandiah, N., Chen, C. P., Kalaria, R. N. & Sze, S. K. Degenerative protein modifications in the aging vasculature and central nervous system: A problem shared is not always halved. Ageing research reviews 53, 100909, doi:10.1016/j.arr.2019.100909 (2019).

    49. Park, J. E., Tse, S. W., Xue, G., Assisi, C., Maqueda, A. S., Ramon, G. P. X., Low, J. K., Kon, O. L., Tay, C. Y., Tam, J. P. & Sze, S. K. Pulsed SILAC-based proteomic analysis unveils hypoxia- and serum starvation-induced de novo protein synthesis with PHD finger protein 14 (PHF14) as a hypoxia sensitive epigenetic regulator in cell cycle progression. Oncotarget 10, 2136-2150, doi:10.18632/oncotarget.26669 (2019).

    50. Dai, L., Lin, J., Said, A. B., Yau, Y. H., Shochat, S. G., Ruiz-Carrillo, D., Sun, K., Chandrasekaran, R., Sze, S. K., Lescar, J. & Cheung, P. C. Pellino1 specifically binds to phospho-Thr18 of p53 and is recruited to sites of DNA damage. Biochemical and biophysical research communications 513, 714-720, doi:10.1016/j.bbrc.2019.03.095 (2019).

    51. Hase, Y., Polvikoski, T. M., Ihara, M., Hase, M., Zafar, R., Stevenson, W., Allan, L. M., Ennaceur, A., Horsburgh, K., Gallart-Palau, X., Sze, S. K. & Kalaria, R. N. Carotid artery disease in post-stroke survivors and effects of enriched environment on stroke pathology in a mouse model of carotid artery stenosis. Neuropathology and applied neurobiology 45, 681-697, doi:10.1111/nan.12550 (2019).

    52. Park, J. E., Dutta, B., Tse, S. W., Gupta, N., Tan, C. F., Low, J. K., Yeoh, K. W., Kon, O. L., Tam, J. P. & Sze, S. K. Hypoxia-induced tumor exosomes promote M2-like macrophage polarization of infiltrating myeloid cells and microRNA-mediated metabolic shift. Oncogene 38, 5158-5173, doi:10.1038/s41388-019-0782-x (2019).

    53. Huang, J., Wong, K. H., Tay, S. V., Serra, A., Sze, S. K. & Tam, J. P. Astratides: Insulin-Modulating, Insecticidal, and Antifungal Cysteine-Rich Peptides from Astragalus membranaceus. Journal of natural products 82, 194-204, doi:10.1021/acs.jnatprod.8b00521 (2019).

    54. Siau, A., Huang, X., Loh, H. P., Zhang, N., Meng, W., Sze, S. K., Renia, L. & Preiser, P. Immunomic Identification of Malaria Antigens Associated With Protection in Mice. Molecular & cellular proteomics : MCP 18, 837-853, doi:10.1074/mcp.RA118.000997 (2019).

    55. Woo, A. R. E., Sze, S. K., Chung, H. H. & Lin, V. C. Delineation of critical amino acids in activation function 1 of progesterone receptor for recruitment of transcription coregulators. Biochimica et biophysica acta. Gene regulatory mechanisms 1862, 522-533, doi:10.1016/j.bbagrm.2019.01.004 (2019).

    56. Adav, S. S., Park, J. E. & Sze, S. K. Quantitative profiling brain proteomes revealed mitochondrial dysfunction in Alzheimer’s disease. Molecular brain 12, 8, doi:10.1186/s13041-019-0430-y (2019).

    57. Kam, A., Loo, S., Dutta, B., Sze, S. K. & Tam, J. P. Plant-derived mitochondria-targeting cysteine-rich peptide modulates cellular bioenergetics. The Journal of biological chemistry 294, 4000-4011, doi:10.1074/jbc.RA118.006693 (2019).

    58. Sze, S. K. Artificially intelligent proteomics improves cardiovascular risk assessment. EBioMedicine 40, 23-24, doi:10.1016/j.ebiom.2019.01.014 (2019).

    59. Gallart-Palau, X., Serra, A., Hase, Y., Tan, C. F., Chen, C. P., Kalaria, R. N. & Sze, S. K. Brain-derived and circulating vesicle profiles indicate neurovascular unit dysfunction in early Alzheimer’s disease. Brain pathology (Zurich, Switzerland) 29, 593-605, doi:10.1111/bpa.12699 (2019).

    60. Shi, M., Chen, B., Mahajan, D., Boh, B. K., Zhou, Y., Dutta, B., Tie, H. C., Sze, S. K., Wu, G. & Lu, L. Amino acids stimulate the endosome-to-Golgi trafficking through Ragulator and small GTPase Arl5. Nature communications 9, 4987, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-07444-y (2018).

    61. Cao, H., Lee, M. K. H., Yang, H., Sze, S. K., Tan, N. S. & Tay, C. Y. Mechanoregulation of Cancer-Associated Fibroblast Phenotype in Three-Dimensional Interpenetrating Hydrogel Networks. Langmuir : the ACS journal of surfaces and colloids 35, 7487-7495, doi:10.1021/acs.langmuir.8b02649 (2019).

    62. Hernández-Pérez, J., Serra, A., Sze, S. K., Conway, P. L., Schlundt, J. & Benavides, J. Identification of Arenin, a Novel Kunitz-Like Polypeptide from the Skin Secretions of Dryophytes arenicolor. International journal of molecular sciences 19, doi:10.3390/ijms19113644 (2018).

    63. Serra, A., Gallart-Palau, X., Park, J. E., Lim, G. G. Y., Lim, K. L., Ho, H. H., Tam, J. P. & Sze, S. K. Vascular Bed Molecular Profiling by Differential Systemic Decellularization In Vivo. Arteriosclerosis, thrombosis, and vascular biology 38, 2396-2409, doi:10.1161/atvbaha.118.311552 (2018).

    64. Kerk, S. K., Lai, H. Y., Sze, S. K., Ng, K. W., Schmidtchen, A. & Adav, S. S. Bacteria Display Differential Growth and Adhesion Characteristics on Human Hair Shafts. Frontiers in microbiology 9, 2145, doi:10.3389/fmicb.2018.02145 (2018).

    65. Zhang, J., Wang, J., Zhou, Z., Park, J. E., Wang, L., Wu, S., Sun, X., Lu, L., Wang, T., Lin, Q., Sze, S. K., Huang, D. & Shen, H. M. Importance of TFEB acetylation in control of its transcriptional activity and lysosomal function in response to histone deacetylase inhibitors. Autophagy 14, 1043-1059, doi:10.1080/15548627.2018.1447290 (2018).

    66. Lim, C. H., Adav, S. S., Sze, S. K., Choong, Y. K., Saravanan, R. & Schmidtchen, A. Thrombin and Plasmin Alter the Proteome of Neutrophil Extracellular Traps. Frontiers in immunology 9, 1554, doi:10.3389/fimmu.2018.01554 (2018).

    67. Kumari, G., Wong, K. H., Serra, A., Shin, J., Yoon, H. S., Sze, S. K. & Tam, J. P. Molecular diversity and function of jasmintides from Jasminum sambac. BMC plant biology 18, 144, doi:10.1186/s12870-018-1361-y (2018).

    68. Dutta, B., Park, J. E., Qing, I. T. Y., Kon, O. L. & Sze, S. K. Soy-Derived Phytochemical Genistein Modifies Chromatome Topology to Restrict Cancer Cell Proliferation. Proteomics 18, e1700474, doi:10.1002/pmic.201700474 (2018).

    69. Wang, L., Cho, Y. L., Tang, Y., Wang, J., Park, J. E., Wu, Y., Wang, C., Tong, Y., Chawla, R., Zhang, J., Shi, Y., Deng, S., Lu, G., Wu, Y., Tan, H. W., Pawijit, P., Lim, G. G., Chan, H. Y., Zhang, J., Fang, L., Yu, H., Liou, Y. C., Karthik, M., Bay, B. H., Lim, K. L., Sze, S. K., Yap, C. T. & Shen, H. M. PTEN-L is a novel protein phosphatase for ubiquitin dephosphorylation to inhibit PINK1-Parkin-mediated mitophagy. Cell research 28, 787-802, doi:10.1038/s41422-018-0056-0 (2018).

    70. Adav, S. S., Wei, J., Terence, Y., Ang, B. C. H., Yip, L. W. L. & Sze, S. K. Proteomic Analysis of Aqueous Humor from Primary Open Angle Glaucoma Patients on Drug Treatment Revealed Altered Complement Activation Cascade. Journal of proteome research 17, 2499-2510, doi:10.1021/acs.jproteome.8b00244 (2018).

    71. Serra, A., Gallart-Palau, X., Dutta, B. & Sze, S. K. Online Removal of Sodium Dodecyl Sulfate via Weak Cation Exchange in Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry Based Proteomics. Journal of proteome research 17, 2390-2400, doi:10.1021/acs.jproteome.8b00156 (2018).

    72. Wongsurawat, T., Woo, C. C., Giannakakis, A., Lin, X. Y., Cheow, E. S. H., Lee, C. N., Richards, M., Sze, S. K., Nookaew, I., Kuznetsov, V. A. & Sorokin, V. Transcriptome alterations of vascular smooth muscle cells in aortic wall of myocardial infarction patients. Data in brief 17, 1112-1135, doi:10.1016/j.dib.2018.01.108 (2018).

    73. Ruiz-Carrillo, D., Lin, J., El Sahili, A., Wei, M., Sze, S. K., Cheung, P. C. F., Doerig, C. & Lescar, J. The protein kinase CK2 catalytic domain from Plasmodium falciparum: crystal structure, tyrosine kinase activity and inhibition. Scientific reports 8, 7365, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-25738-5 (2018).

    74. Adav, S. S., Subbaiaih, R. S., Kerk, S. K., Lee, A. Y., Lai, H. Y., Ng, K. W., Sze, S. K. & Schmidtchen, A. Studies on the Proteome of Human Hair – Identification of Histones and Deamidated Keratins. Scientific reports 8, 1599, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-20041-9 (2018).

    75. Subbaiah, R. S., Kerk, S. K., Lian, Y., Lunny, D., Sze, S. K., Ng, K. W., Schmidtchen, A. & Adav, S. S. Identification of Antibacterial Components in Human Hair Shafts. Acta dermato-venereologica 98, 708-710, doi:10.2340/00015555-2952 (2018).

    76. Adav, S. S., Wei, J., Qian, J., Gan, N. Y., Yip, L. W. L. & Sze, S. K. Aqueous humor protein dysregulation in primary angle-closure glaucoma. International ophthalmology 39, 861-871, doi:10.1007/s10792-018-0885-3 (2019).

    77. Hemu, X., Serra, A., Darwis, D. A., Cornvik, T., Sze, S. K. & Tam, J. P. Peptidomic Identification of Cysteine-Rich Peptides from Plants. Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.) 1719, 379-393, doi:10.1007/978-1-4939-7537-2_26 (2018).

    78. Wongsurawat, T., Woo, C. C., Giannakakis, A., Lin, X. Y., Cheow, E. S. H., Lee, C. N., Richards, M., Sze, S. K., Nookaew, I., Kuznetsov, V. A. & Sorokin, V. Distinctive molecular signature and activated signaling pathways in aortic smooth muscle cells of patients with myocardial infarction. Atherosclerosis 271, 237-244, doi:10.1016/j.atherosclerosis.2018.01.024 (2018).

    79. Sun, L., Camps, S. G., Goh, H. J., Govindharajulu, P., Schaefferkoetter, J. D., Townsend, D. W., Verma, S. K., Velan, S. S., Sun, L., Sze, S. K., Lim, S. C., Boehm, B. O., Henry, C. J. & Leow, M. K. Capsinoids activate brown adipose tissue (BAT) with increased energy expenditure associated with subthreshold 18-fluorine fluorodeoxyglucose uptake in BAT-positive humans confirmed by positron emission tomography scan. The American journal of clinical nutrition 107, 62-70, doi:10.1093/ajcn/nqx025 (2018).

    80. Su, W., Kumar, V., Ding, Y., Ero, R., Serra, A., Lee, B. S. T., Wong, A. S. W., Shi, J., Sze, S. K., Yang, L. & Gao, Y. G. Ribosome protection by antibiotic resistance ATP-binding cassette protein. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 115, 5157-5162, doi:10.1073/pnas.1803313115 (2018).

Graduate Student Opportunities

Age-related diseases such as cardiovascular disease, dementia, and cancers are major public health concerns, as they not only cause significant disability and suffering but also place a heavy burden on healthcare systems and economies. Understanding the underlying causes of these diseases and developing new treatments is crucial for improving the quality of life for the elderly and reducing the societal costs of aging.

Undergraduate Student Opportunities

Our lab actively seeks highly motivated PhD and MSc students to join our research team. If you’re deeply passionate about investigating the fundamental aging processes through basic research and making groundbreaking discoveries in immunotherapy for age-related diseases, we invite you to reach out. Contact Dr. Newman Sze at nsze@brocku.ca for potential research opportunities.

Our lab is focused on uncovering the molecular mechanisms and developing innovative immunotherapy for age-related diseases such as cardiovascular disease, dementia, and cancer. We use cutting-edge techniques such as genomics, proteomics, and systems biology to identify new targets for immunotherapeutic drug development. The research is crucial for improving the quality of life for the elderly and reducing the overall socioeconomic cost of aging.

Our lab is seeking highly motivated undergraduate students to join our team. If you have a strong passion for biomedical research and are eager to learn new research skills, please contact Dr. Newman Sze, nsze@brocku.ca for research opportunities