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Yingzi Cong, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Medicine

 

Phone: 205-934-6679

E-mail: ycong@uab.edu

 

Dr. Cong attended Shangdong University, People’s Republic of China, where he received his B.S. and Ph.D. in developmental biology.  The work for his Ph.D. was performed in Dr. Henry Wortis’s laboratory at Tufts University.  Postdoctoral studies were completed with Dr. Helen Mullen at the University of Missouri and then in Dr. Charles Elson’s laboratory at UAB. He joined the faculty of the Department of Medicine in 1996.

Dr. Cong’s research involves immune regulation in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), the role of adjuvants in mucosal immunity, and the induction of tolerance. Animal models of IBD have been generated in order to determine the pathogenesis and regulation of the disease. His work has shown that Th1 cells reactive to enteric bacterial antigens mediate colitis in C3H/HeJBir mice and that multiple subsets of regulatory cells down-regulate the development of the colitis.  He is currently using cloned enteric bacterial antigens to study antigen-specific responses in the pathogenesis and regulation of IBD. The mechanisms of mucosal immunity and tolerance are studied by using cholera toxin, a potent mucosal adjuvant, and the cholera toxin B subunit, a strong inducer of tolerance, to determine the early events in mucosal immunity and tolerance.

Selected publications

  1. Cong, Y., Weaver, C.T. and Elson, C.O. The mucosal adjuvanticity of cholera toxin involves enhancement of costimulatory activity by selective upregulation of B7.2 expression. J. Immunol. 159:5301-5308, 1997.

  2. Cong, Y., Brandwein, S.L., McCabe, R.P., Ridwan, B.U., Birkenmeier, E.H., Sundberg, J.P. and Elson, C.O. CD4+ T cell response to enteric bacteria in colitic C3H/HeJBir mice: Increased Th1 response and induction of colitis. J. Exper. Med. 187:855-864, 1998.

  3. Cong, Y., Weaver, C.T, Lazenby, A. and Elson, C.O. Colitis induced by enteric bacterial antigen-specific CD4+ T cells requires CD40-CD40 ligand interactions for a sustained increase in mucosal IL-12. J. Immunol. 165:2173-2182, 2000.

  4. Cong, Y., Oliver, F.J. and Elson, C.O. Effects of cholera toxin on macrophage production of costimulatory molecules. Eur. J. Immunol. 31:64-71, 2001.

  5. Cong, Y., Weaver, C.T., Lazenby, A. and Elson, C.O. Bacterial-reactive T-regulatory cells inhibit pathogenic immune responses to the enteric flora. J. Immunol. 169:6112-6119, 2002.

  6. Cong. Y., Konrad, A., Iqbal, N. and Elson, CO. Probiotics and immune regulation of   inflammatory bowel diseases. Current Drug Targets – Inflammation & Allergy. 2:145-154, 2003.

  7. Elson, CO. Cong, Y. Lorenz, R. and Weaver, CT. New developments in experimental models of inflammatory bowel disease. Curr. Opin. Gastroenterol. 20:360-367, 2004.

  8. Lodes, MJ., Cong. Y., Elson, CO., Mohamath, R., Landers, CJ., Targan, SR., Fort, M. and Hershberg, RM. Bacterial flagellin is a dominant antigen in Chrohn disease. J. Clin. Invest. 113: 1296-1306, 2004.

  9. Cong, Y., Liu, C., Weaver, C. T. and Elson, C.O. Early upregulation of T cell IL-10 producing plays an important role in oral tolerance induction. Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. 1029: 319-321, 2004.

  10. Cong, Y., Konrad, A., Iqbal, N., Hatton, R.D., Weaver, C.T. and Elson, C.O. Generation of antigen-specific, Foxp-3 expressing CD4+ T regulatory T cells by inhibition of APC proteosome function. J. Immunol. 174:2787-2795, 2005.