Xinjun Ji, Ph.D.
Research Assistant Professor of Genetics
Department: Genetics
Contact information
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
Center for Computational and Genomic Medicine
3501 Civic Center Blvd, CTRB, Room 9063
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Center for Computational and Genomic Medicine
3501 Civic Center Blvd, CTRB, Room 9063
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Office: 215-590-6057
Education
B.S. (Molecular Biology)
JiLin University, Changchuan, China, 1992.
M.S. (Molecular Pharmacology)
Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China, 1995.
Ph.D. (Biochemistry & Molecular Biology)
Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China, 1999.
Permanent linkB.S. (Molecular Biology)
JiLin University, Changchuan, China, 1992.
M.S. (Molecular Pharmacology)
Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China, 1995.
Ph.D. (Biochemistry & Molecular Biology)
Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China, 1999.
Description of Research Expertise
The structure and function of the RNA-binding proteins (RBPs).The structure and function of Ribonucleoprotein (RNP) complexes.
mRNA splicing, mRNA alternative polyadenylation, mRNA translation, mRNA stability and mRNA decay.
Developing RNA-based approach to modulate RNA-protein interactions as both a research tool and therapeutic means in diseases.
Developing mouse model to study RBPs’ involvement in development and disease.
Poly (rC) binding protein (PCBPs) conditional mouse models on development of hematopoietic stem cells.
Mechanism of microRNA and RBPs’s action and their roles in normal development and diseases.
Predicting and validating splicing outcome of genomic variants on splicing.
Creation and phenotyping of mouse models bearing rare disease genetic variants.
Selected Publications
Robert Wang, Feng Wang, Nicole DeBruyne, Xinjun Ji, Nicole Engelhardt, Joseph Park, Amber Notaro, Samantha Gaerlan, Ryan Park, Matthew J. Schultz, Sheila Clever, Elizabeth McCormick, Kelsey Keith, Bobby G. Ng, Kathryn E. Kadash-Edmondson, Hudson H. Freeze, Christina Lam, Eva Morava, Ingo Helbig, Marni J. Falk, Rebecca D. Ganetzky, Andrew C. Edmondson, Lan Lin, Yi Xing: Targeted long-read RNA sequencing for rare disease diagnosis and variant interpretation. Science Advances 12(eady9895), April 2026.Xinjun Ji, Joanna Tober, Stephen A. Liebhaber, Nancy A. Speck: RNA binding protein PCBP1 functions in the Endothelial-to-Hematopoietic transition during hematopoietic stem cell formation. Exp Hematol . 2026 Jun 10:161:105470. doi: 10.1016/j.exphem.2026.105470 2026.
Xinjun Ji, Anupama Jha, Jesse Humenik, Louis R. Ghanem, Andrew Kromer, Christopher Duncan-Lewis, Elizabeth Traxler, Mitchell J. Weiss, Yoseph Barash, Stephen A. Liebhaber : RNA-Binding Proteins PCBP1 and PCBP2 Are Critical Determinants of Murine Erythropoiesis Molecular and cellular biology 41(9): e0066820, Aug 2021.
Mengge Shan, Xinjun Ji, Kevin Janssen, Ian M. Silverman, Jesse Humenik, Ben A. Garcia, Stephen A. Liebhaber, Brian D. Gregory : Dynamic changes in RNA-protein interactions and RNA secondary structure in mammalian erythropoiesis Life Science Alliance 4(9): e202000659, Jul 2021.
Xinjun Ji, Jesse Humenik and Stephen A. Liebhaber: A cytosine-rich splice regulatory determinant enforces functional processing of the human α-globin gene transcript. Blood 133 (21): 2338-2347, May 2019.
Louis R. Ghanem, Andrew Kromer, Ian M. Silverman, Xinjun Ji, Matthew Gazzara, Nhu Nguyen, Gabrielle Aguilar, Massimo Martinelli, Yoseph Barash and Stephen A. Liebhaber: Poly(C)-Binding Protein Pcbp2 Enables Differentiation of Definitive Erythropoiesis by Directing Functional Splicing of the Runx1 Transcript. Mol Cell Biol 38(16): e00175-18, Jul 2018.
Jeremy D. Grevet, Xianjiang Lan, Nicole Hamagami, Christopher R. Edwards, Laavanya Sankaranarayanan, Xinjun Ji, Saurabh K. Bhardwaj, Carolyne J. Face, David F. Posocco, Osheiza Abdulmalik, Cheryl A. Keller, Belinda Giardine, Simone Sidoli, Ben A. Garcia, Stella T. Chou, Stephen A. Liebhaber, Ross C. Hardison, Junwei Shi, Gerd A. Blobel. : Domain-focused CRISPR screen identifies HRI as a fetal hemoglobin regulator in human erythroid cells. Science 361 (6399): 285-290 Jul 2018.
Xinjun Ji, Jesse Humenik, Daphne Yang, Stephen A Liebhaber: PolyC-binding proteins enhance expression of the CDK2 cell cycle regulatory protein via alternative splicing. Nucleic Acids Research 46(4): 2030-2044, Feb 2018.
Xinjun Ji, Daphne Yang, Elizabeth Traxler, Louis R. Ghanem, Mitchell J. Weiss, Stephen A, Liebhaber: PolyC-binding proteins, PCBP1 and 2, play essential roles in erythropoiesis. Hemoglobin Switching Conference. Pacific Grove, California, USA, Sep 2016.
Ji, X., Park, J. W., Bahrami-Samani, E., Lin, L., Duncan-Lewis, C., Pherribo, G., Xing, Y., Liebhaber, S. A.: alphaCP binding to a cytosine-rich subset of polypyrimidine tracts drives a novel pathway of cassette exon splicing in the mammalian transcriptome. Nucleic Acids Res 44(5): 2283-97, Mar 2016.