Eric Yixin Yang
Assistant Professor
Department of Biological Sciences
1200 Commercial Street
Emporia State University
Emporia, KS 66801
Phone: 620-341-5610 (office)
Email: yyang@emporia.edu

Education:

Ph.D. in Molecular Biology, Microbiology and Biochemistry, 2003
Department of Microbiology
Program of Molecular Biology, Microbiology and Biochemistry
Southern Illinois University at Carbondale
Advisor: Dr. Douglas Fix

Medical Degree in Clinical Medicine, 1996
Dalian Medical University
Dalian City, Liaoning Province, China

M.S. in Computer Science, 2005
Department of Computer Science
Southern Illinois University at Carbondale
Advisor: Dr. Bidyut Gupta

Courses Taught:

Bioinformatics MC 459/859, Emporia State University
Honors Biology GB 171, Emporia State University
Microbiology MC316, Emporia State University
Microbiology Laboratory MC317, Emporia State University
Pathogenic Microbiology MC561, Emporia State University
Pathogenic Microbiology Laboratory MC562, Emporia State University
Principles of Biology Laboratory GB141, Emporia State University
Java Programming, Southern Illinois University

Membership:

Sigma Xi the Scientific Research Society
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
American Society of Microbiology (ASM)
American Society of Cell Biology (ASCB)
Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society

Selected Presentation (seminars-posters-invited speaker):
  1. 06/2008: Poster, "Characterization of a Novel Antimicrobial and Antitumor Agent Produced by Brevibacillus laterosporus." 108th General Meeting of American Society for Microbiology (ASM), Boston, MA
  2. 03/2008: Poster, "Characterization of Antimicrobial and Antitumor Agents Produced by Isolates of Soil from Rocky Mountain National Park". 140th Annual Meeting of the Kansas Academy of Science, Emporia, Kansas
  3. 03/2008: Poster, "The Effect of ginkgo biloba Leaf Extract and Its Active Constituents on the Proliferation of Malignant Melanoma Cells". 140th Annual Meeting of the Kansas Academy of Science, Emporia, Kansas
  4. 11/2004: Poster, "The Isoflavone Genistein Reduces SOS-Dependent Mutation in Escherichia coli", ASM Conference on DNA Repair and Mutagenesis: From Molecular Structure to Biological Consequences, Southampton, Bermuda
  5. 10/2003: Invited speaker, "Reduction of Transversion Mutations by the Isoflavone Genistein in Escherichia coli", Fall 2003 Seminar Series, Program of Molecular Biology, Microbiology and Biochemistry, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale
  6. 05/2003: Invited speaker, "The Application of Embryonics and Immunotronics in Fault Tolerance", Semester Seminar, Department of Computer Sciences, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale
  7. 02/2003: Invited speaker, "Soybean and Human Health", invited by Civic Center of Carbondale as part of Health Awareness Program.
  8. 05/2002: Poster, "Effect of Isoflavone Genistein on Mutagenesis induced by ENU and UV in Escherichia coli", 104th General Meeting of American Society of Microbiology, New Orleans, LA
  9. 05/2000: Poster, "Alleviation of ENU-induced Mutagenesis by genistein", 2nd Annual Midwest DNA Repair Symposium, University of Louisville

Selected Publications:
  1. Zhao Y. and Y. Yang (2008). Characterization of Antimicrobial and Antitumor Agents Produced by Isolates of Soil from Rocky Mountain National Park. Transaction of the Kansas Academy of Science Vol. 111, No.1-2 Spring 2008 (Abstract)
  2. Zhao Y. and Y. Yang (2008). The Effect of Ginkgo Biloba Leaf Extract and its Active Constituents on the Proliferation of Malignant Melanoma Cells. Transaction of the Kansas Academy of Science Vol. 111, No.1-2 Spring 2008 (Abstract)
  3. B. Gupta, S. Rahimi, and Y. Yang (2007). A Novel Roll-back Mechanism for Performance Enhancement of Asynchronous Checkpointing and Recovery, Informatica, 31 (2007) 1-13
  4. Schrock J. R. and Yang, Y (2007). The Growing Problem of Plagiarism and the Correct Use of Science Citation. Biology Teaching Vol. 32, No.7 2007
  5. Yang, Y. and D. Fix. (2006). Genetic Analysis of the Anti-mutagenic Effect of Genistein in Escherichia coli. Mutat Res. 600 (2006): 193- 206
  6. Gupta, B., Yang, Y., Rahimi, S., and Vemuri, A. (2006). A High-Performance Recovery Algorithm for Distributed Systems. ISCA 21st International Conference on Computers and Their Applications, March 23-25, 2006, Seattle, Washington, USA. Editor: J. Jackson, ISBN: 1-880843-58-7
  7. Yang, Y. and D. Fix. (2001). Reduction of ENU-induced Transversion Mutations by the Isoflavone Genistein in Escherichia coli. Mutat Res. 8; 479(1-2):63-70.

Research Interests
I have been conducting research on molecular mechanism of mutagenesis and DNA repair. I am especially interested in the potential anti-mutagenic (thus anti-cancer) properties of genistein, the main isoflavone in soy. By employing an Escherichia coli reversion assay system, I found that the Genistein could inhibit mutagenesis induced by N-ethyl-N-nitrosourea (ENU) or ultraviolet (UV) light. Interestingly, my study showed that genistein might reduce the mutation frequency by interfering SOS-dependent mutagenesis. The effects of genistein on proteins on SOS pathway, as well as other proteins closely related to DNA repair and mutagenesis, were extensively examined. The research results culminated in two papers published in Mutation Research.
My lab is currently pursuing additional four research projects. (1) Effects of Ginkgo biloba leaf extract and its constituents on the cell progression and apoptosis of malignant melanoma and prostate cancer cells. (2) Interactive effects between dam (methylation of GATC sites) deficiency mutation and the mutations of mutD, mutH, mutL, or mutS (genes required for methyl-directed mismatch repair). (3) Effect of mercuric compound at sublethal concentrations on the survival of bacterial cells challenged by UV or ENU. (4) Characterizing a novel antimicrobial and anti-tumor agent produced by Brevibacillus laterosporus, a spore-former isolated from soil sample.

Research team:
Zhaoyang Xiao (now a postdoctorate fellow at University of North Dakota)
Yunqi Zhao, M.S. student
Xiaobo Wang, M.S. Student
Brandy Hanson (now a medical student at Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences)
Anthony Westby, undergraduate
Tim Moser, undergraduate

Last updated 1 September 2008.
Provide comments to Eric Yang at yyang@emporia.edu.
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