Dr. Li started his academic career in cancer research in 1990s. His research findings have been accepted in several prestigious journals such as Science, Cancer Cell, Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, Mol Cell Biol, Blood, Oncogene, J Biol Chem, etc., and are widely cited by research scientists. Knowing how to kill cancer cells has helped him to protect normal cells from injury-induced cell death in his present research of sepsis and trauma. Since 2005, Dr. Li has focused his study on pharmacological treatment of sepsis, traumatic hemorrhagic shock, traumatic brain injury (TBI), with emphasis on histone modifying enzymes, including histone deacetylase (HDAC) and peptidyl-arginine deiminase (PAD). His team developed a novel antibody against citrullinated histone H3 (CitH3), which is significantly different from commercially available one. Targeting CitH3 for early diagnosis/prognosis and treatment of sepsis has captured researchers’ attention in both academia and industry. These findings are being translated into the clinic now.