Chunyu Liu

About

Chunyu Liu, PhD, is a Professor of Biostatistics at Boston University School of Public Health. She earned her PhD in Biostatistics with a specialization in statistical genetics from Boston University. Her professional experience includes working as a statistical geneticist at Biogen Idec Inc. in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and contributing to the Population Sciences Branch & Framingham Heart Study (FHS) at NHLBI in Framingham, Massachusetts. Her research focuses on assessing risk factors associated with cardiovascular disease (CVD) and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Dr. Liu has held leadership roles as the Principal Investigator for multiple R01 and R21 grants since 2018, and she is involved in collaborative research as a lead biostatistician, contributing to over 135 peer-reviewed manuscripts. She is also active in the scientific community as a member of the NIH’s Genetics of Health and Disease Study Section, an Associate Editor for the Cardiovascular Digital Health Journal, and an Academic Editor for PLOS ONE. Her work includes developing analytical methods for mitochondrial DNA sequence variations and participating in various working groups within genetic epidemiology research.

Research topics

• Biology
• Genetics
• Neuroscience
• Political Science
• Medicine
• Computer Science
• Psychiatry
• Psychology
• Nanotechnology
• Evolutionary biology

Selected publications

• Mapping genomic loci implicates genes and synaptic biology in schizophrenia

  Nature · 2022 · 2693 citations

  , much of which is attributable to common risk alleles. Here, in a two-stage genome-wide association study of up to 76,755 individuals with schizophrenia and 243,649 control individuals, we report common variant associations at 287 distinct genomic loci. Associations were concentrated in genes that are expressed in excitatory and inhibitory neurons of the central nervous system, but not in other tissues or cell types. Using fine-mapping and functional genomic data, we identify 120 genes (106 pro…

  DOI

• Sex-Dependent Shared and Nonshared Genetic Architecture Across Mood and Psychotic Disorders

  Biological Psychiatry · 2021 · 135 citations

  BACKGROUND: Sex differences in incidence and/or presentation of schizophrenia (SCZ), major depressive disorder (MDD), and bipolar disorder (BIP) are pervasive. Previous evidence for shared genetic risk and sex differences in brain abnormalities across disorders suggest possible shared sex-dependent genetic risk. METHODS: We conducted the largest to date genome-wide genotype-by-sex (G×S) interaction of risk for these disorders using 85,735 cases (33,403 SCZ, 19,924 BIP, and 32,408 MDD) and 109,94…

  DOI

• Single-cell multi-cohort dissection of the schizophrenia transcriptome

  Science · 2024 · 125 citations

  The complexity and heterogeneity of schizophrenia have hindered mechanistic elucidation and the development of more effective therapies. Here, we performed single-cell dissection of schizophrenia-associated transcriptomic changes in the human prefrontal cortex across 140 individuals in two independent cohorts. Excitatory neurons were the most affected cell group, with transcriptional changes converging on neurodevelopment and synapse-related molecular pathways. Transcriptional alterations includ…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Proteomics networks linking diet to cardiometabolic risk factors: the Framingham Heart Study

  American Journal of Clinical Nutrition · 2025-12-01 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Incomplete Depression Feature Selection with Missing EEG Channels

  ArXiv.org · 2025-11-10

  preprintOpen access

  As a critical mental health disorder, depression has severe effects on both human physical and mental well-being. Recent developments in EEG-based depression analysis have shown promise in improving depression detection accuracies. However, EEG features often contain redundant, irrelevant, and noisy information. Additionally, real-world EEG data acquisition frequently faces challenges, such as data loss from electrode detachment and heavy noise interference. To tackle the challenges, we propose…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• NIH Grant R01MH110920

  NIH · $2.0M · 2021

• NIH Grant R21MH083521

  NIH · $304k · 2010

• NIH Grant R21AG045789

  NIH · $487k · 2018

Frequent coauthors

• Chao Chen

  297 shared

• Rujia Dai

  167 shared

• Yan Xia

  Xinxiang Medical University

  140 shared

• Michael J. Gandal

  130 shared

• Daniel Levy

  National Heart Lung and Blood Institute

  120 shared

• Yarong Song

  Union Hospital

  101 shared

• Elliot S. Gershon

  University of Chicago

  100 shared

• Thomas G. Schulze

  National Institute of Mental Health

  99 shared

Labs

• Admissions TeamPI

Education

• Ph.D., Medical Genetics

  Central South University

  1998

• M.S., Biology

  Xiamen University

  1994

• B.S., Biology

  Wuhan University

  1991

Similar researchers at Boston University

• Alexa S. Beiserh-188
• Kathryn L. Lunettah-132
• Gina Marie Pelosoh-99