Email

lingyong.li@bcm.edu

Positions

Assistant Professor

Neuroscience
Baylor College of Medicine
Houston, TX US

Addresses

BCM-Smith Medical Research Bldg (Lab)

Room: BCMS-S607
Houston, TX 77030
United States

Education

PhD from Nanjing Agricultural University

12/2006 - Nanjing, China

Postdoctoral Fellowship at Institute of Neuroscience, Chinese Academy of Sciences

03/2009 - Shanghai, China

Postdoctoral Fellowship at Vanderbilt University

07/2014 - Nashville, TN

Professional Interests

• Chronic pain, chronic pain-induced mood disorders, and opioid analgesic tolerance and addiction.

Professional Statement

Chronic pain is a major health problem in the United States and affects 100 million Americans, but the current treatments are inadequate and there has been limited progress in the development of novel therapies for this condition, which result in the epidemic of opioid abuse. Our goal is to discover the novel plasticity mechanisms that underlie chronic pain, chronic pain associated comorbidities such as depression, and opioid-induced analgesic tolerance and hyperalgesia. We are also devoted to translational pain research to discover and develop novel therapeutic strategies for chronic pain management. To resolve the chronic pain, depression, and opioid mechanisms comprehensively, at the genetic, molecular, cellular, neural circuit, and behavioral levels, we use a multidisciplinary approach spanning high throughput sequencing, bioinformatics, mice genetics, opto-/chemo-genetics, electrophysiology, in vivo calcium imaging, molecular and cellular biology, biochemistry, pharmacology, virus-mediated gene transfer, neuroanatomical imaging, and behavioral testing.

Selected Publications

• Ru Q, Lu Y, Saifullah MAB, Blanco FA, Yao C, Cata JP, Li DP, Tolias KF, and Li L. "Tiam1-mediated synaptic plasticity drives comorbid depressive symptoms in chronic pain.." (Under improvement based on reviewers’ comments of Science). :
• Li L, Chen SR, Zhou MH, Wang L, Li DP, Chen H, Lee G, Jayaraman V, and Pan HL "α2δ-1 switches the phenotype of synaptic AMPA receptors by physically disrupting heteromeric subunit assembly." Cell Rep. 2021 July ; 36 (3): 109396.
• Chen J, Li L (co-first author), Chen SR, Chen H, Xie JD, Sirrieh RE, Maclean DM, Zhang Y, Jayaraman V, and Pan HL. "A novel α2δ-1-NMDA receptor coupling is critically involved in neuropathic pain and gabapentin action.." Cell Rep. 2018 22 : 2307-2321.
• Li L, Chen SR, Chen H, Wen L, Hittelman WN, Xie JD, Pan HL "Chloride Homeostasis Critically Regulates Synaptic NMDA Receptor Activity in Neuropathic Pain." Cell Rep. 2016 May ; 15(7) : 1376-1383.

Memberships

Society of Neuroscience

Gulf Coast Consortium for Translational Pain Research

Therapeutic Innovation Center at BCM

Funding

Synaptic structural and functional plasticity underlying transition to chronic pain

$1,440,000.00 (09/01/2020 - 08/31/2024)

Grant funding from DoD Chronic Pain Management Research Program

Synaptic plasticity mechanism underlying the development of opioid analgesic tolerance and opioid-induced hyperalgesia (OIH)

$200,000.00 (06/01/2020 - 05/31/2022)

Grant funding from Mission Connect/TIRR Foundation

Synaptic plasticity mechanisms underlying chronic pain-induced depression

$60,000.00 (01/01/2021 - 12/31/2022)

Grant funding from Mission Connect/TIRR Foundation

Synaptic plasticity mechanisms underlying neuropathic pain following spinal cord injury

$800,000.00 (09/01/2021 - 08/31/2024)

Grant funding from DoD Spinal Cord Injury Research Program