Dr. Xiaojun Ren received both his B.E. in Polymer Chemistry and Engineering and his Ph.D. in Macromolecular Chemistry and Physics from the Department of Chemistry (now the College of Chemistry) at Jilin University. After completing his Ph.D., Dr. Xiaojun Ren joined the Department of Chemistry at the University of Cambridge as a research associate in the laboratory of Prof. Sir Shankar Balasubramanian. During his time at Cambridge, Dr. Ren developed and applied single-molecule fluorescence microscopy to investigate the assembly and function of human telomerase, collaborating with Prof. Sir David Klenerman. Inspired by the principles of living systems, he later joined the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) laboratory of Prof. Tom Kerppola at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor, where his research focused on understanding epigenetic mechanisms in stem cells.
In 2012, Dr. Xiaojun Ren began his independent career as an assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Colorado Denver. The Ren laboratory has pioneered the development and application of live-cell single-molecule tracking to observe the trajectories of epigenetic complexes within living cells. Dr. Ren has also developed single-molecule techniques to quantify the composition of native chromatin complexes and to study the dynamics of epigenetic complexes on chromatin. His lab was among the first to demonstrate that epigenetic complexes can organize chromatin through liquid-liquid phase separation.
In 2024, the Ren laboratory relocated to the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of North Carolina Charlotte, which is rapidly expanding its research programs with the goal of becoming a globally recognized, emerging top-tier research university. The laboratory will continue to focus on the roles of liquid-liquid phase separation in genome organization under physiological and pathological conditions, employing a multidisciplinary approach that integrates single-molecule technologies, genomic methods, genetic engineering, proteomics, biochemistry, and molecular biology.
