About the Authors

Youlin Xia

Affiliation Department of Biology and Biochemistry, University of Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Yoshio Yamaoka

yyamaoka@bcm.tmc.edu (YY); xgao@uh.edu (XG)

Affiliations Department of Medicine-Gastroenterology, Veterans Affairs Medical Center and Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, United States of America, Department of Environmental and Preventive Medicine, Oita University Faculty of Medicine, Yufu, Japan

Qi Zhu

Affiliation Department of Biology and Biochemistry, University of Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Ivan Matha

Affiliation Department of Biology and Biochemistry, University of Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Xiaolian Gao

yyamaoka@bcm.tmc.edu (YY); xgao@uh.edu (XG)

Affiliation Department of Biology and Biochemistry, University of Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: YX YY XG. Performed the experiments: YX YY QZ IM XG. Analyzed the data: YX YY XG. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: YX YY XG. Wrote the paper: YX YY XG.