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### Zhiyuan Alumni Yu Chuyue publishes paper on Nature, revealing a new mechanism for regulating brain nerves in tumors

2026-02-06
144

A landmark study published in Nature reveals a previously unknown mechanism by which lung cancers actively communicate with the brain to evade the body's immune system. The research, titled “Tumour–brain crosstalk restrains cancer immunity via a sensory–sympathetic axis,” identifies a specific neural pathway that tumors exploit to remotely suppress anti-cancer defenses, opening new avenues for therapy. Yu Chuyue, Zhiyuan Life Sciences alumni (class of 2018), and a Ph.D candidate at Yale University served as co-first author, contributing pivotally to the core mechanistic discoveries and experimental validation. Wang Ruiqi, Zhiyuan Engineering alumni (class of 2010), and a Ph.D candidate at Yale, also contributed as a key collaborator on this interdisciplinary project.

Led by researchers at Yale University, the study focused on lung adenocarcinoma. It discovered that tumor cells release factors that attract and activate sensory neurons of the vagus nerve. These neurons then relay signals to the brain, which in turn amplifies sympathetic nervous system outflow back to the tumor site. There, sympathetic neurotransmitters instruct alveolar macrophages to disable critical anti-tumor T cells, creating an immunosuppressive environment that fuels cancer progression. This establishes a complete “tumor → sensory nerve → brain → sympathetic nerve → immune suppression” axis.

Crucially, interrupting this circuit showed significant therapeutic promise. Genetic ablation of the involved sensory neurons, chemogenetic inhibition of their activity, or local chemical denervation all successfully reduced tumor growth and extended survival in models by restoring anti-tumor immunity. Clinical data corroborated the pathway's relevance: in non-small cell lung cancer patients, high expression of neural markers like TRPV1 was linked to poorer prognosis.

Yu credits her undergraduate training at Zhiyuan College, known for its high-intensity, cross-disciplinary curriculum, for fostering the collaborative mindset and problem-solving skills essential for such complex research. Her early research experience in a neurobiology lab, guided by former Zhiyuan program director Professor He Shigang, planted the initial seed for her interest in neural regulation.

This work represents a paradigm shift in understanding cancer as not merely a local disease, but one capable of systemic neural manipulation. It provides a novel conceptual framework and actionable therapeutic targets at the intersection of cancer neuroscience and immunology.

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