Dr. Wenyan Mei, in the Department of Comparative Biosciences, recently published a paper in the journal Nucleic Acids Research called “PTBP1 controls intestinal epithelial regeneration through post-transcriptional regulation of gene expression.” The work was done in collaboration with other researchers across the University of Illinois campus.

In an interview with the College of Veterinary Medicine, she answers questions to help non-scientists understand her findings about how the body supports the growth of new cells—and see how this knowledge could be applicable to developing treatments to fight the out-of-control cell growth in some forms of cancer.

Dr. Mei is also an affiliate faculty member in the Microbiome Metabolic Engineering theme at the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, in the Cancer Center at Illinois, an affiliate of the Personalized Nutrition Initiative, and a faculty member in the Division of Nutritional Sciences.

Read more from the College of Veterinary Medicine.