Rate My Professor Xiaoying Cui

Dr. Xiaoying Cui serves as Senior Researcher in the Developmental Neurobiology Research Stream at the Queensland Centre for Mental Health Research (QCMHR) and as Honorary Senior Fellow/Lecturer at the Queensland Brain Institute (QBI), University of Queensland. Her career at UQ spans over 15 years, beginning as a postdoctoral researcher in the McGrath and Eyles groups around 2008. In recognition of her early work, she received a Smart Futures Fellowship to investigate whether vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy contributes to schizophrenia risk. More recently, she has been awarded an Early- and Mid-Career Researcher (EMCR) mobility grant and participates as a committee member for Biological Psychiatry Australia. Cui completed her PhD thesis titled 'Stress and dopamine in the dorsal striatum' at the University of Queensland, focusing on cell neurochemistry and biochemistry.

Cui's research specializations center on the molecular mechanisms of brain development, particularly dopaminergic neuron differentiation, RNA epigenetics, and environmental factors influencing schizophrenia etiology. She has demonstrated that knockdown of the long non-coding RNA HOTAIRM1 in embryonic mouse ventral midbrain reduces expression of dopaminergic neuron specification factors via involvement of the histone methyltransferase EZH2, while sparing non-dopaminergic neurons. In the Enhanced Dopamine in Prodromal Schizophrenia (EDiPS) model, her meRIP sequencing revealed increased m6A RNA methylation in the dorsal striatum linked to heightened dopamine synthesis, with elevated expression of the writer protein Mettl14 and reader YTHDF1. Her contributions extend to vitamin D's role in the central nervous system, showing its regulation of dopamine neuron maturation, GDNF/Ret signaling, and mitigation of brain dysfunction in deficiency states. Key publications include 'Vitamin D and schizophrenia: 20 years on' (Molecular Psychiatry, 2021), 'Developmental inhibition of long intergenic non-coding RNA HOTAIRM1 impairs dopamine neuron differentiation and maturation' (International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 2021), 'Vitamin D and the Central Nervous System: Causative and Preventative Mechanisms in Brain Disorders' (Nutrients, 2022), 'Increasing dopamine synthesis in nigrostriatal circuits alters striatal RNA methylation' (npj Schizophrenia, 2023), 'Prenatal hypoxia alters the early ontogeny of dopamine neurons' (Translational Psychiatry, 2022), and 'Vitamin D differentiates dopamine neurons in vitro' (Neuroscience, 2025). Her work has advanced understanding of neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities in psychiatric disorders.