Professor Li Chan

Profile

ORCID iD: 0000-0001-5146-8242

Professor Li Chan studied Medicine at Cambridge before undertaking her basic paediatric training at Barts and the London Hospitals. She first joined the Centre for Endocrinology in 2005 to undertake her PhD investigating a novel receptor trafficking protein MRAP2 (melanocortin receptor accessory protein two). This was funded by a Barts and the London Charity clinical training fellowship and then an MRC clinical research training fellowship. Her work on the melanocortin receptor accessory proteins MRAP and MRAP2 as regulators of the melanocortin receptor family has revealed important novel aspects of melanocortin receptor biology. During this time she also contributed to two other areas of research: phenotype/genotype analysis of patients with Familial Glucocorticoid Deficiency (FGD), and the long-term follow-up of paediatric Cushing’s disease patients.

After her PhD she was awarded the only national GRID training post in Paediatric Endocrinology. She was awarded a Tenure-track MRC/Academy of Medical Sciences clinician scientist fellowship to study the effects of MRAPs in energy homeostasis and adrenal function. She was a visiting scientist at the Sanger Institute and Institute of Metabolic Sciences in Cambridge. In 2012, she was awarded the Journal of Endocrinology outstanding young researcher prize. She was one of 20 female academics to participate in the first SUSTAIN Academy of Medical Sciences Leadership Programme and promoted to Clinical Senior Lecturer in Paediatric Endocrinology. In 2017, she joined the Department of Comparative Medicine at Yale School of Medicine as a visiting Associate Professor for a 6 month period.

She is Senior Editor for Endocrine Connections, co-lead for the new Lifelong Health (LHH) multidisciplinary faculty of medicine theme at QMUL, co-lead for GeCiP endocrinology and metabolism domain and GOSH Charity’s Research Assessment Panel member. 

Research

Group members

• D Jackson
• C Lai, N Nguyen
• R Xu
• D Popat
• C Smith (with Prof Metherell)

Summary 

Publications

• Friedman HR, Gaston L, Chan L et al. (2024). 6569 An Increase, Rather Than Absolute Amount, Of Corticotropin-Releasing Hormone (Crh) Drives Mouse Anxiety-Like Behavior.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1210/jendso/bvae163.106

  
  

  QMRO:
• Smith CJ, Abdullah MA, Hassan SS et al. (2024). 8482 Genetic Aetiology Of Primary Adrenal Insufficiency In Sudan.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1210/jendso/bvae163.193

  
  

  QMRO: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/103243
• Elhassan YS, Appenzeller S, Landwehr L-S et al. (2024). Primary unilateral macronodular adrenal hyperplasia with concomitant glucocorticoid and androgen excess and KDM1A inactivation.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1093/ejendo/lvae106

  
  

  QMRO: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/99185
• Ramakrishnan A, Popat D, Purushothaman P et al. (2024). A Novel Maternally Inherited GNAS Variant in a Family With Hyperphagia and Obesity: 3 Cases.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1210/jcemcr/luae125

  
  

  QMRO: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/100580
• Elhassan Y, Appenzeller S, Landwehr L-S et al. . Primary unilateral macronodular adrenal hyperplasia with concomitant glucocorticoid and androgen excess and KDM1A inactivation.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1530/endoabs.99.ep919

  
  

  QMRO: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/100709
• Purushothaman P, Popat D, Ramakrishnan A et al. . A novel maternally inherited GNAS variant in a family with hyperphagia and obesity.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1530/endoabs.95.oc2.1

  
  

  QMRO: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/99186
• Popat D, Xu R, McCormick P et al. . Gain-of-function mutation F278C in MC2R results in reduced beta-1-arrestin recruitment and increased cAMP implicating impairment of S280 phosphorylation.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1530/endoabs.94.oc5.2

  
  

  QMRO: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/99187
• Smith C, Abdullah M, Hassan S et al. . Genetic aetiology of primary adrenal insufficiency in Sudan.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1530/endoabs.94.p15

  
  

  QMRO:
• Elhassan Y, Appenzeller S, Landwehr L et al. . Primary unilateral macronodular adrenal hyperplasia (pumah) with concomitant glucocorticoid and androgen excess due to kdm1a activation and constitute mc2r activation.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1530/endoabs.94.cc1

  
  

  QMRO:
• Smith C, Jackson A, Al-Salihi A et al. (2023). SAT292 Adrenal Insufficiency Associated With Biallelic Mutations In Porphyria Genes.

  
  

  DOI: 10.1210/jendso/bvad114.296

  
  

  QMRO: https://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/103246

Collaborators

Internal

• Dr Caroline Brennan
• Professor Leo Guasti
• Professor Lou Metherell
• Professor Paul Chapple

External

• Dr Tony Coll (University of Cambridge)
• Prof Stephen O'Rahilly (University of Cambridge)
• Dr Giles Yeo (University of Cambridge)
• MRC Technology/LifeArc
• Dr Marika Charalambous (King’s College, London)
• Prof Sabrina Diano & Prof Tamas Horvath (Yale University)
• Prof Joe Majzoub (Boston Children’s)