After an eight-year relationship and 4 academic papers together, the couple, Chong Zhang and Ruidong Xue, have brought new breakthroughs to the research community. They published a paper on Nature recently, revealing the landscape of whole-genome variants in hepatocellular carcinoma associated with hepatitis B virus.

Academic “arguments” do not hurt

The latest research is titled “the Chinese Liver Cancer Atlas (CLCA)”. To systematically understand the pathogenic factors for Chinese individuals with liver cancer, the team of Chong Zhang and Ruidong Xue performed deep whole-genome sequencing (average depth, 120×) of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) tumors from 494 patients at different regions in China, equipped with transcriptome sequencing results of 239 cases, and the total amount of data is nearly 300T. Based on multiple algorithms, the team identified substantial new contributors for HCC, including 6 coding-driven events and 28 new non-coding-driven events, and several genes are closely associated with hepatic metabolic pathway.

In addition, based on the reported 81 mutational signatures, this research found 5 previously undescribed mutational signatures.

When Chong Zhang and Ruidong Xue joined this project, there were certain samples and sequencing results. But due to the large amount of data, Chong Zhang synthesized more than 10 algorithmic tools and repeatedly debugged the results before finally obtaining a biologically meaningful list.

Chong Zhang and Ruidong Xue always argued during research. “In the process of this project, we argued numerous times”, said Ruidong Xue. However, such academic arguments do neither hurt nor impact their relation. Chong Zhang said, “We follow whoever can provide literature to support their conclusions”, because everyone has a same target---- to ensure that the results produced are true and reliable and can withstand test.

Meeting and falling in love in the lab

In 2012, Ruidong Xue became one of the earliest students in Fan Bai’s group, and three years later, Chong Zhang joined the group. After six months together, the two fell in love with each other and became a couple, and also carried out their first academic collaboration project.

Since then, scientific research has become a part in their relation. Hepatocellular carcinoma, genetics, and staging ...... are academic terms that form the keywords of their daily communication.

Since they often unconsciously discuss scientific research when analyzing Q in the lab, strolling around the school, or even shopping, they developed a deep “revolutionary friendship” and the project progressed steadily. In 2019, the study was successfully published in Cancer Cel.1Q.

Later, the two went on to conduct and publish other work related to liver cancer in Nature Commutations in 2020, Advanced Science in 2021, and in Nature recently.

Scientific research is the only choice in the future

The latest paper on Nature has special meaning for them.

Towards the end of the work on data analysis, their child was born, which brought more happiness and also presented new challenges to their work. However, the two had a tacit mutual understanding during their long-time relationship.

Chong Zhang and Ruidong Xue thought that their scientific research is progressing steadily, and is unquestionably the only option in the future plans.