þ Doctoral Supervisor

þ Master Supervisor

Current Professional Societies

Member, American Society for Cell Biology

Member, Association for Women in Science

Research Areas

Molecular mechanisms of membrane trafficking and autophagy

Unconventional protein secretion mediated by ATG9A vesicles

Honors

Beijing Overseas High-Level Talents – Youth Project

Beijing Distinguished Expert

Young Top-Notch Talent Training Program of Universities Affiliated to Beijing Municipality

Selected Publications

1. Zhang W, Ji C, Li X, He T, Jiang W, Liu Y, Wu M, Zhao Y, Chen X, Wang X, Li J, Zhang H*, Wang J*. Autophagy-independent role of ATG9A vesicles as carriers for galectin-9 secretion. Nature Communications. 2025 May 7;16(1):4259.

2. Song JZ, Li H, Yang H, Liu R, Zhang W, He T, Xie MX, Chen C, Cui L, Wu S, Rong Y, Pan LF, Zhu J, Gong Q*, Wang J*, Qin Z*, Xie Z*. Recruitment of Atg1 to the phagophore by Atg8 orchestrates autophagy machineries. Nature Structural & Molecular Biology. 2025 Sep;32(9):1606-1621.

3. Wang S, Ren J, Chi J, Guan Y, Zheng R, Wang J*, Liu X*, Huang H*. RHOD mediates ATG9A trafficking to promote autophagosome formation during autophagy in cancer. Autophagy. 2025 Apr 1:1–19.

4. Chen X*, Wang J, Tahir M, Zhang F, Ran Y, Liu Z*, Wang J*. Current insights into the implications of m6A RNA methylation and autophagy interaction in human diseases. Cell & Bioscience. 2021;11(1):147.

5. Chen X*, Yu C, Guo M, Zheng X, Ali S, Huang H, Zhang L, Wang S, Huang Y, Qie S*, Wang J*. Down-regulation of m6A mRNA methylation is involved in dopaminergic neuronal death. ACS Chemical Neuroscience. 2019;10(5):2355–2363.

6. Wang J, Davis S, Zhu M, Miller EA, Ferro-Novick S*. Autophagosome formation: where the secretory and autophagy pathways meet autophagy. Autophagy. 2017;13(5):973–974.

7. Wang J, Davis S, Menon S, Zhang J, Ding J, Cervantes S, Miller E, Jiang Y, Ferro-Novick S*. Ypt1/Rab1 regulates Hrr25/CKIδ kinase activity in ER– Golgi traffic and macroautophagy. Journal of Cell Biology. 2015;210(2):273– 285.

8. Wang J, Tan D, Cai Y, Reinisch KM, Walz T, Ferro-Novick S*. A requirement for ER-derived COPII vesicles in phagophore initiation. Autophagy. 2014;10(4):708–709.

9. Wang J, Menon S, Yamasaki A, Chou HT, Walz T, Jiang Y, Ferro-Novick S*. Ypt1 recruits the Atg1 kinase to the preautophagosomal structure. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. 2013;110(24):9800–9805.

Personal Statement

Since 2010, my research has focused on the molecular mechanisms of vesicular transport and autophagy. I identified Atg1 as the first effector protein of Rab1/Ypt1 in autophagy, demonstrated that ER-derived COPII vesicles provide an important membrane source for autophagosome formation, and revealed the regulatory role of the kinase Hrr25/CK1δ in membrane remodeling during autophagy.

My laboratory recently discovered a previously unrecognized unconventional secretory pathway that utilizes Golgi-derived ATG9A vesicles—traditionally considered seed membranes for autophagosome biogenesis—to export unconventionally secreted proteins (e.g., Galectin-9). This work provides new insights into the regulation of immunity, development, and metabolism through unconventional secretion.